Wonders In Dementialand: Dementialand

by Suzka Collins

  Violet's eyes moved into their dance. The music bathed in the marrow of her bones. She beamed and felt the power inside her. Everything was loud. She would link herself to the subtle rhythm flowing throughout the universe.

  Violet in time loved the gypsies and opened her self to their dance and storytelling.

  This night, the gypsies' dance told of a wedding story that took place in Chicago on a hot summer night when the air outside was thick and old; when the sun left slowly, wet and exhausted from the humidity; and when lazy fireflies lowered the sky and talked a bit with the stars. They spoke of a time when large windows in a prominent city pavilion were as open as they could be, begging the outside air to come inside and dance with the music; trees close by just watched – the trees had no rhythm not like the gypsy ladies.

  The women held out their hands and helped Violet scoot to the end of her bed where a small opening offered just enough space to escape.

  The freedom enticed Violet.

  The dancers befriended her and Violet trusted her gypsy friends. She could not remember what they stole, so they were not thieves.

  Violet's face changed as she turned all her attention on the dancers with a quiet sharp look. "I will indeed dance with you." The initial request she felt in her heart.

  Once Violet left her bed, once she let go, she moved around the room as if she were floating on her feet. The air romanced itself on oceans of salt, which lightened her load. A natural wonder inside her swayed her hips back and forth and turned her in place.

  The gypsies danced around her. Everything was impetuous and unrehearsed. They danced hard, deliberate with spectacular turns and balances - hot blooded and seductive, beautiful and appealing without being vulgar. Their dance was effortless, jiggling tambourines as extensions to their bodies, never loud or aggressive. They danced all their colors outside the lines.

  They danced and laughed and continued twirling and spinning around Violet. The gypsy women kept the music going.

  I was sleeping on the couch the entire time and never heard the gypsy women but was wakened by a sound, the jingle of bangles. Of course, I was dreaming.

  "Mom. Mom, what are you… what are you doing? How did you get out of bed?" Startled and oblivious at the same time, Violet spun around slowly, paying no serious attention to anything outside the music. There was color and excitement in the room that I never felt before or since. My mother was waving one hand in the air and making tiny steps from side to side. She cupped her arthritic hand, scrunching the bottom of her nightgown in its palm and held it out to the side rolling and weaving it into the air. Elmo danced with Dora, Betty Boop with Cookie and Kitty, the other ballooned airheads swayed back and forth to the music only heard by angels or by the night’s breeze from the opened window.

  She looked me in the eyes as if she were trying to make out if I knew anything. Her eyes were bright and full, like a new bride, well lined with rich memories stripped of their calendared dates. And at the same time, she was fading away from me. I had to look twice before I could see the only woman I knew as my mother.

  Violet was dancing with someone inside of her. Dancing with the muses and the natural rhythm God gave her. Her feet double-stepped hard on the names, dates and information lost in her head. She twirled herself around dancing like a baby swan, young and purposeful.

  I could only watch.

  [ My mother loved to dance. She was the first one on the dance floor with my father at every family wedding. She would have danced at wakes too if they had better music.]

  Dementia pursued my mother in the nights. Maybe it was when she danced with the gypsies that it had made up its mind that it was going to have Violet for its own. It wouldn't be easy. My mother had guarded her wits and hid them from the nighttime robbers. But dementia carefully thought this through. It knew it had to be patient if it wanted to have its prize in the end.

  Dementia hid behind trees on the side of the night's moons and in dark's empty spaces, waiting for its chance. It would come from behind her quietly and whisper her name. Wherever Violet went she would hear its echo.

  Violet disappeared more often, sometimes for only a few seconds, other times for an entire day. In some ways, it was as if she was having an affair. She couldn't hide the change inside of her. The unfaithfulness to status quo, to the norm, to the structure and temples she had built. I noticed her struggling with an unexplainable excitement jumping inside of her and the guilt she must have had that pushed away its promised happiness. It was that scary freedom only a new love brings. The wide freedom so big and so loud it disturbs and whacks everything in its path.

  Was my mother holding on to a secret, afraid she might get caught, worried that her new lover would call for her impulsively at any time? How could anyone resist a new love's passion?

  I found myself obsessed in wandering curiosity. Where does she go when she leaves me?

  28.

  THE AFFAIR WITH SKEETER Violet stood in a roped line at the border with the long crowd of other travelers. Her black purse was tightly tucked under her arm. Another hand, her own, gripped the purse's side opening for extra protection. She was in full view of the armed soldiers who guarded the border between the official recorded reality and the undocumented realities that took refuge in Violet's head. Faceless inspectors behind tall counters checked all purses for contrabands.

  Violet wore a silk-like belted dress in soft white with lavender flowers. Its silky material calmed her girdled body. The girdle's job was to keep Violet and her memories strapped in place - memories she needed; they were her credentials, her identity. Violet took everything she could remember and hid them in the zipped secret pockets inside her purse. She was a careful smuggler. The border inspectors already confiscated her box of Christmas Eve memories; the creamed mushrooms and the milked bread cubes sweetened with poppy-seeds and sugar. They seized the honey that dripped from her father's finger that had marked her forehead with a small cross, a Slovakian tradition smuggled from Europe. The remaining honeys that were later poured on white wafers embossed with pictured scenes of the baby Jesus in the manger were gone.

  It was all gone. They took it all.

  The inspectors impounded her wedding dress, all her floured recipes, and erased the faces off her family photos. The tall dashing man who once twirled her high above the ground as well as their three birthed babies, gone, all seized. Birthdays, Sundays, presidents and numbers were scrambled and dumped from her memory. Violet watched the inspectors handcuff Jesus and take him to another room. Before Jesus vanished, he turned back and winked at Violet. You'll be ok.

  "Move to one side. Let us through. Everyone move to one side."

  A harnessed dog dragging a uniformed agent behind him sniffed Violet's shoes. The dog sniffed everyone's shoes. Violet pressed her purse closer to her body and watched the nervous dog intensely sniff and drag the official through the line whipping everyone who got in his way with his muscular tail.

  A tiny man with baby chin hair and an oversized uniformed shouted out "Next!" His voice was stuck in changing.

  Violet scooted to his counter. She forgot to bring a bag of candy, a sweet bribe from a little defenseless lady with age.

  "Do you have any memories you want to declare?" "No."

  "Have any pictures, flashbacks, stories." The young inspector slid his elbow further into the counter and leaned sarcastically to ask, "any relative holy cards up your sleeve?"

  "Of course not."

  The inspector looked over the counter and visually scanned Violet's body, stopping at the black leather purse tucked under her arm. "What's in the purse?"

  Violet knew how to play the game. "What, this purse? Are you talking about this silly thing? Oh there's nothing inside. Why, it's not even a purse really. I haven't the slightest idea why I even carry this silly thing around."

  The inspector looked into Violet's blank eyes looking for something to give away any secret memories she wanted to keep. He thought of his mother, how she worked
as a cleaning lady in an office building at nights for him to continue his schooling. Now he works for the government, a border agent. His mother was proud of her son.

  "You look familiar. I might know your mother." Violet's last hope.

  "Move on." He let Violet pass but put her on the list of suspicious characters.

  Violet fooled him. There were thousands of secrets hidden in her purse, secrets and memories that took her elsewhere. She held onto them tightly and kept them to herself. Even God did not know of them.

  Violet flattened her hand against her chest pressing down on the giggle jumping inside. Violet moved quickly past the memory inspectors and followed the crowd into another room; a room large as a school gymnasium and beige, a scuffed beige surface. It was littered with people moving in unruly opposite directions to themselves. The air had no choice but to hold its breath. It was unwilling to move the heavy odors in fear that the room would gag and cough on the travelers. It all smelled like spoiled meat that sat on the counter too long.

  Violet walked through the cluttered area of travel toward the metal detector. It would be the final check before she could cross the border. She followed the crowd and funneled herself into the slow line. Sounds behind her reported canceled travel announcements. She never looked back at the lonely place with its suffocating sky. Violet kept her eyes on the line ahead.

  A glass wall divided the borders. On the other side Violet saw crowds of people watching the arriving visitors. The glass wall was filled with happy heads on spring necks that bobbled up, down and sideways. Jumping children popped up between the voiceless heads.

  In the center of the waiting crowd was an attractive steady-headed man dressed in tall black. Violet couldn't help but notice his striking appearance in the crowd's color. He was statuesque, handsome and mysterious. Violet noticed the man float across the glass. He moved as if he had no feet, gliding toward the glass wall’s edge. He mouthed a silent sound of her name.

  Violet dug her heals into the ground as the man moved closer to the border's port of entry. Everything in her head argued with her. What is he looking at? Turn your head away. We don't know this man… Violet told herself. Look away and whatever you do, don't let him catch you looking. Turn away. Turn away quickly. Violet repositioned her purse and fiddled with its straps, a reasonable distraction that kept her mind busy.

  Time teased Violet and blindfolded any conventional thoughts. Her instincts moved her torso as far as it could outside the line and straightened her head for a level view. She swept the wall looking for the attractive stranger behind the glass. Suddenly, her eyes hooked into his eyes like a truck about to run into a tree. She snapped back and reprimanded her actions. I told you eyes not to go there. See what you started. Now he saw you looking. Stop it. Look away. Don’t let him catch you.

  The curious admirer behind the glass window softened his face and smiled at Violet's girlish innocence.

  The line moved slowly. Violet clutched her purse close to her breasts as she waited for another TSA officer to wave her through the two large metal detectors. She told her eyes to stay close and not to wander off, as small children would often do when traveling with their parents. But her eyes would stray to the side without paying attention. They went to the mysterious man on the other side of the window.

  Violet held him in her eyes just long enough for him to notice then quickly looked away disowning her curiosity. Her legs dangled like a marionette whose strings got tangled in play from above by its puppeteer. He made her nervous. Nervous enough that her first thought was of peeing.

  She talked inside her head. What's he up to? There is something odd about that man. There are layers of purpose in him. I don't know what it is but... Violet turned direction in the middle of her thought and scanned the walls around her. I think I need to find a toilet.

  A tall TSA officer waved Violet through. The image of her stranger stuck in her eyes like fresh wallpaper. She walked slowly through the metal detectors as directed. When she reached the middle, fate grabbed her legs. The heel of her shoe got caught on a shagged bathroom-like rug. Her body leaped in front of her leaving part of her behind. The hard floor on the other side was where she was destined to crash, breaking all her bones into sharp chips. As if she were watching an instant replay, the accident's slow motion deepened the terror inside her.

  Arms came from nowhere. The wings of an angel in flight caught the falling queen. Her heart raced. White doves flew from the rafters. Sanctified bishops swept their purple garments blessing the air. Violet squinted her eyes in the angel's sunlight. She was mesmerized by words as they floated down on parachutes.

  "Are you ok?" An angel with dark hair caught Violet. His soft curls were loosely pulled back and tied together at the base of his neck. He wore Jesus sandals made by Nike.

  His eyes were young and filled with the remnants of laughter. "Let me help you up." Her handsome savior raised her gently to her feet. With one arm he held her waist to steady her balance. "Madame, should I call for help? It looks like you might have injured your ankle."

  Her angel looked into the crowd. "Is there someone here to meet you...any family, children?" Violet pealed her eyes off his face and looked at the area around her. Words left her slowly not sure where to go. "I... I don't know."

  The strange angel looked around and noticed that everyone had moved into groups and slowly faded into the walls.

  "Then let me be of service to you. My full name is Anopheles deMentia but everyone calls me Skeeter."

  The moon, the stars, all the gods in heaven applauded. Fate cleared a way for Skeeter and Violet to walk to a small table with two chairs sitting next to a closed Starbucks.

  "I must tell you, until I actually saw you, I had no idea who I was to meet or why I was sent here. Life is so simple. It has a plan for us all."

  The language spoken on the stranger's side of the border was foreign to Violet. If only she had her bag of candy to give to the rescuing angel, a small gift of gratitude. Nothing was familiar. Violet called her eyes back and lightly scolded them for talking to strangers.

  "Let me get you something to drink. Some water or jasmine tea perhaps." Without waiting for a response, he helped Violet into a chair. "Which do you prefer?"

  “Oh no, nothing for me. I have Ensure in my purse. Maybe I'll take a tiny sip of that to steady my nerves." They spent hours together talking, nearly an entire afternoon. Violet leaned closer into herself and talked of things she thought she forgot. There was clarity in their priceless exchange. Her polished fingers twirled her hair pulling him in closer into her stories. Under the table, her toes raised themselves in the girlish delight of it all. Between them, her purse comfortably napped on the small table without the slightest worry of being grabbed or whisked away by traveling thieves.

  After a time, Violet puffed up her hair with her hands and said, "Oh, I must go. I have so much to do. It was so nice meeting you and thank you again for catching my fall. I don't know what would have happened to me if you weren't there."

  Skeeter smiled and kissed her hand, "It was fate. We were meant to meet and be together." "Well, I don't know about that, but I must say it was a most enjoyable afternoon." Violet could not find a reason to leave except to possibly catch her breath. She was dizzy, confused. Perhaps it was his cologne.

  "Please don't leave. What do you have to do?" "Well... I don't…” Violet looked around the empty gymnasium for some answer. “I… I don’t exactly remember at the moment what it is… but I am a very busy woman. That I know for sure. And at some point today I have to bake two trays of my special rolled cabbage horns. Everyone loves them, you know." She caught her words in flight and giggled. "Of course you don't know that. We just met."

  He smiled and added an irresistible wink. There was something about this woman. He wanted to spend the entire day with her.

  She discarded her excitement and his flirtatious gestures and went about the business she could not remember. Her ill-fated memories could explain nothi
ng. Violet simply knew she needed to return to Chicago, return home to the corner back room with the tall windows that stood shoulder-to-shoulder. The neighborhood birds that sat on outside branches would wonder where she had been but Violet felt assured they would say nothing to anyone of her absence.

  * I fell asleep on the couch reading The Horse’s Mouth. The book slid out from my hand, fell to the floor and shook me awake. A semi-reliable clock on the other side of the room read 3:18 AM. I must have slept for hours. Outside the cold jellied the windows.

  My senses were startled but eventually calmed down and focused their attention toward my mother. She was wide-awake sitting upright in her bed. She looked beautiful, rested, untouched. Her legs bent under the covers, her toes pointed up in the air wiggling the covers. The dark fell apart around her making way for the moon to get a closer look at this tiny woman. I couldn't stop staring at her. She looked like she could lead a parade of elephants. Her face seemed to be holding a secret or no knowledge whatsoever. There was a stack of dreams between us.

  Cookie, Dora and Princess Belle were suspiciously quiet. ”Mom... mom, do you want something? Do you have to go to the bathroom?”

  “No.” The answer was quick like a girl with a secret.

  “Do you want something to drink… maybe some Ensure?"

  "No. Not really… “

  Quiet.

  “… but I do have a taste for some jasmine tea. That would be good. Make me a warm cup of jasmine tea?”

  "Tea? Jasmine tea? Really?" This was a coffee drinking house. "We don’t have any tea. I'll have to pick some up at the grocery tomorrow. We better get some sleep for now."

  I tucked the blankets around my mother and kissed her. "Good night. Sweet dreams."