Memoir of the Sunday Brunch

by Julia Pandl

  Leaning back on a dining room chair, I caught glimpses of them. Maggie, Chrissy’s daughter—twelve and lanky, with perfect skin, a tangled mess of blond hair, and a mouth full of braces—kneeling in bed next to my father, giggling, at what I didn’t know. And Julia, who was just six, sitting on a stool next to George, trying to read her choice to him. The story was about Valentine’s Day, a spin-off of The Night before Christmas. George held one side of the book in his hand and she held the other in hers. He let her stumble through the first few pages before scooping her into the bed beside him. She laid her head on the pillow and stuck her thumb in her mouth, and he took over the reading. I noticed he kept his eyes open.

  9/14, 6:30 a.m.: Antinausea gel

  11:00 a.m.: Morphine

  2:30 p.m.: Nausea gel

  4:00 p.m.: Morphine

  Vomiting

  6:30 p.m.: Antinausea gel

  1 raspberry, Stella

  8:00 p.m.: Morphine, patch change

  Like it or not, death comes with accoutrements. Necessity carries them across the threshold, and before you know it, you’re making room for the adjustable bed, the tray table, the emesis basin, the mouth swabs, the A+D ointment, and the baby monitor. The night before Terry died I remember my father looking around at all the hospice equipment and saying very matter-of-factly, “It’s hard work being born, and it’s hard work dying.” A bit of an understatement, sure, but so true. If you’re lucky enough to prepare, on either side, the beginning and the end are both crowded with a slew of very similar accessories, designed for the most part around convenience, comfort, and safety. Glaring as it is, the circumstances provide the only real difference.

  So necessity did its thing, and we did ours, and George trusted. Trust. That was the key. It allowed us to exist in the bizarre three-part palliative harmony. New things found their way in and either kicked out or demanded space among the old. I remember lying in his hospital bed one night, looking around, waiting while Chrissy helped him in the bathroom. I heard the two of them talking, but their words sounded like drizzle, indistinct, muffled. It was not the original bedroom, of course—the rose-print wallpaper, brittle and peeling along the baseboards, the speckled green carpeting, and the dusty blinds were all different—but it was undeniably my parents’ bedroom. There was the bust of Jesus, standing on George’s dresser; the Madonna and Child sitting on Terry’s lingerie chest; and St. Thérèse of Lisieux hanging on the wall next to the door, above the light switch. These folks had been there since the beginning. These folks my mother carried across the threshold.

  St. Therese stared at me. The picture had peripheral vision, which I suppose would have been terrific if she were an actual person standing in the room. But she was flat, inanimate, and anchored in a frame, so her wandering eyes were scary. My spine tingled. I casually shifted my gaze somewhere, anywhere else, hoping she wouldn’t notice. In the chair next to the bed, within arm’s reach, sat the stainless-steel barf bowl, a damp washcloth slung over its side. The newspaper was folded and perched on a pile of books someone had stacked on the floor. And on his nightstand were morphine packets, fanned out—four of a kind—a tube of antinausea gel, a box of latex gloves, a borrowed baby monitor, a half glass of Stella, and George’s broken rosary.

  He never actually said the rosary, at least not that I ever saw. He just thumbed the dark wooden beads in his pocket. I think they provided comfort. The chain’s link was broken right where the mysteries began. Joyful, Luminous, Sorrowful, Glorious; different depending on the day and the season. And the crucifix was lost. Still, it had been a gift from my mother and he carried it everywhere. I watched him place it in a hundred plastic airport security bins over the years—Milwaukee, Chicago, London, Newark, Rome, and Dublin.

  George clung to the notion that he would pass away quietly in his sleep. Really, who could blame him? “I think tonight’s the night, girls,” he said again, and Chrissy and I both laughed.

  “Here, Dad,” she said, handing him the rosary.

  He slipped it slowly from one palm to the other and stared at it pensively, rolling the soft wood between his fingers. I couldn’t say what he was thinking. I didn’t ask. It occurred to me, though, for just a second, that his greatest mystery, the greatest mystery, was about to be explained. Finally, he wrapped his fist around a handful of beads and held them up.

  “I want you girls to know,” he said, letting a couple of strands slip through his fingers, “just because I have this with me doesn’t mean I’m actually saying it.”

  Honestly.

  “Okay, Dad,” I said.

  “I don’t want anyone thinking I’ve become ultrareligious all of a sudden.”

  Chrissy rolled her eyes. “I wouldn’t worry about it, Dad.”

  “Yeah, Dad,” I said, “if someone from Opus Dei calls—”

  “Tell ’em I’m in a coma.”

  “You got it,” I said, laughing.

  Twenty minutes later, Chrissy and I were cleaning up the kitchen when we heard him stir. “Shhh,” Chrissy said, turning off the tap and leaning into the receiver of the baby monitor. “Listen.”

  A dry towel in one hand and a dripping pot in the other, I tiptoed next to her, as if he could hear me.

  “Take and receive, O Lord, all my liberty, all my memory, all my understanding . . .”

  “What is that?” I asked.

  “Shhh,” she repeated, and held up her hand. “It’s the—”

  “You have given me all that I am . . .”

  “—St. Ignatius prayer.”

  “All that I possess; I surrender it all to you that you may dispose of it according to your will . . .”

  A massive lump formed in my throat and took my breath away. I held my fist over my mouth, looked over at Chrissy, and saw a painfully bittersweet expression staring back at me.

  Antinausea

  Morphine

  Vomiting

  Antinausea

  Apple sauce

  Prune juice

  Stella

  I expected Father Tim. I had called him in the morning on my way to work and asked if he would come over and see George. It’s what Catholics do. We call the priest. We get blessings. We cover our bases. George had been in and out of lucidity for days, so we figured it was time. But when I walked into his room, I found my dad’s doctor, Ted O’Reilly, sitting in the chair next to the bed.

  “Hi, Dr. O’Reilly.”

  “Hi.”

  “What brings you over?” He was George’s general practitioner. He had been off the case for months, but we called him now and then to pick his brain.

  “I just wanted to check in and see how things were going with my friend here.”

  He put his hand on George’s shoulder. My father liked Dr. O’Reilly; we all did. He was a cutie-pie—auburn hair, round apple cheeks, blue eyes, kind smile, nice bod, the whole package. Plus, he helped Terry die, and he did it well. No extraordinary measures; he just sat on the edge of her bed, took her hand, and told her it was time. Believe me, it’s not something you see every day. Doctors do life, not death.

  “I picked up a six-pack of Stella on my way home. You want one?”

  He hesitated for a second, and then said, “Yeah, sure, why not, I’m not on call.”

  Katie, Peggy, and Amy were drifting about the house. Eventually we all ended up sitting around George’s bed, chatting, each of us with a small glass of beer. Headlights shined on the wall and a car door slammed.

  Father Tim let himself in. “What’s this?” he said, laughing as he made his way down the hall. “I thought I was coming to give you last rites and you’re sitting here drinking a beer.”

  George giggled and twitched.

  “Do you want one, Father Tim?” Katie asked.

  “No . . . I’m sorry, I can’t. I’ve got a thing—”

  “C’mon, it’s Stella,” she prodded.

  He shook his head, about to decline again, and then he paused. I saw the look in his eye change. He had expected sadnes
s and foreboding; instead, he found an accidental party. I knew he would stay. There was a homily in it.

  “Sure, what the heck.”

  I poured him a glass and handed it to him.

  “This is made in Belgium, you know, in Leuven. I studied there.”

  “Kate! Kate!” George burst in. “Go get that Manneken Pis off the mantel.”

  Katie, Peggy, Amy, and I exchanged apprehensive looks. We were all thinking the same thing. He’s talking like a sausage. It was a Terry expression. An equivalent idiom today might be, WTF?

  “What was that, Dad? German?” I asked.

  “No. Kate, go get it,” he demanded. “It’s on the mantel.”

  “Okay,” Katie said doubtfully, leaving the room.

  “What’re you talking about, Dad?” Amy asked.

  “The Manneken Pis. It’s a statue—”

  “I know what he’s talking about,” Father Tim said. “It’s a statue in Leuven, of a boy—”

  “Yes, yes!” George exclaimed, raising his glass. “It’s a statue of a boy pissing.”

  Father Tim smiled. “He’s right.”

  “Here, bring it here,” George said, waving Katie back into the room.

  We all leaned forward and followed her hand. Sure enough, he was right. It was a three-and-a-half-inch bronze likeness of a boy pissing.

  “Where did you get that, Dad?” Amy laughed.

  “I brought it home from the war.”

  “Where has it been?”

  “On the mantel!” said the sausage, as if my sisters and I had all been born blind. I had never seen it before in my life, but I wasn’t about to argue. Besides, I knew my mother well enough to figure out that there was no way she’d have let a statue like that hang around a house with nine kids. She had a hard enough time keeping a lid on the potty-talk. The last thing she needed was a little naked wiener, bronze or not, hanging out—pardon the pun—on the mantel. I assumed George had discovered it in a box after she died.

  “Tell the story, George,” Father Tim said, gesturing with his glass.

  So he did. George told the story with a clarity we hadn’t seen in a while, a story about a little boy, the son of a wealthy merchant, who had gone missing in Leuven. The merchant formed a search party and made the promise that if his beloved son was found, wherever he was found, whatever he was doing, he would build a statue in grateful thanksgiving to God. The boy, it turned out, was found, taking a leak.

  We looked to Father Tim for verification, and he nodded. That was the story.

  The conversation continued. We talked about nothing in particular, just cocktail party gibber-jabber. The toilet in the bathroom was on the fritz and had been running for days. Whoever moved George’s king-size bed out to the garage had carelessly dropped the box spring on my front bike tire. Father Tim and Dr. O’Reilly agreed to help us move it. Brett Favre had broken Dan Marino’s touchdown record. The weather was changing. The days had grown shorter.

  Father Tim’s blessing came on the heels of a toast to family, friends, and George. The seven of us clasped hands, said an Our Father, and received Holy Communion. George closed his eyes and folded his hands and we left him alone. Sure, he had a few hang-ups where the church was concerned; he feigned disbelief and called it hocus-pocus, but he cherished the presence of the Risen Lord in Holy Communion. Transubstantiation, it’s a mind-bender for most Catholics. This one, George took on faith.

  Later, when we tucked him in and said our good nights and our “just in case” good-byes, he said, “Now that was an Academy Award–winning night.”

  10/20, 2:00 a.m.: 2 morphine, 2 antinausea

  7:30 a.m.: 2 morphine, 2 antinausea, 1 dropper

  My father died that afternoon. In the end it was simple and quiet. A bunch of us were there—Amy, Jimmy, Ashley, Katie, Peggy, and me—crowded around his bed, watching his chest sporadically rise and fall. In his lap we laid his broken rosary, a picture of our mother, and a red rose. We touched him. We prayed, and we whispered, “It’s okay, Dad. It’s okay.” Stevie arrived around one thirty, sat down, and gently slipped George’s hand inside his own. I sat there, across from my brother, letting silent tears drop into pink blankets and staring at those hands, folded together. It was a gift, that moment, one full grace that only the beginning and the end can offer. My father’s hand was fragile, worn, and ragged; Stevie’s was smooth and strong. The two were bound together, yet separated by a generation and a breath, holding on and letting go.

  Naturally, a party ensued. I know, I know, but let’s face it, grief can get a little boring. So one by one, we trickled out to the patio, while family, friends, and neighbors trickled up the driveway. It was a gorgeous October day, high sixties and sunny. The kind of day George would have loved. Wisconsin weather will do that, serve up something beautiful and warm right in the middle of bitter and cold. We made drinks and funeral arrangements and we celebrated George’s life into the evening.

  The party was still going strong when I called it a night. I walked down the hallway and into my father’s room. His body was gone, zipped into a nonporous black bag and carted down Lake Drive in the back of a minivan. The plastic hospital bed mattress crunched as I sat on its edge. Chatter and music drifted through the windows, along with the scent of a fall fire from the pit on the patio. A log popped. Someone had dusted George’s nightstand, stacked his books in a neat little pile, largest to smallest, and swept the hospice debris into the garbage can on the floor. His rosary and his watch were left sitting next to the lamp. I picked up the watch and stretched the silver band with my fingers. It was a woman’s watch, though not particularly feminine. George had brought it back from Switzerland after the war, a gift for his mother. Presumably he took it back when she died. He wore it all the time. I slid it around my wrist, grabbed the broken rosary in my fist, kissed it, and went to bed.

  THE NEXT MORNING I woke up on top of my bedspread, wearing what I had on the night before, with the rosary still in my grip. The house was quiet and dark. I wondered if I was alone. After all, there was no longer a need for two of us to be in the house. I got up, found Katie asleep in the guest room, and saw that someone had closed George’s bedroom door. I remember making for the knob and thinking, I can’t have that. Death had done something to the air. Overnight, it had become thick. Dragging my body down the hallway was like footslogging through a vat of Jell-O. I opened my father’s bedroom door and let the morning breeze flow through the house.

  It was another sunny day, though cooler. I walked outside to get the paper. The screen door clapped against its frame as my stocking feet hit the chilly patio bricks.

  “Good morning,” a voice called from across the street.

  I looked up and saw our neighbor and old friend of my parents, Mrs. Hoff. She had been over the night before, toasting George.

  “Morning,” I smiled, and tiptoed toward her. We embraced around the basket she carried in the crook of her arm. It felt good to hug someone’s parent.

  “This is for you kids,” she said, holding out the basket. Something about her reminded me of Terry—her expression, maybe her red lipstick.

  “Ah,” I said, sighing, taking the basket and looking over the goods. It was overflowing with a dozen eggs, bacon, sausage, bread, fresh-squeezed orange juice, and coffee. “Brunch comes to us today. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.”

  THE OBITUARY READ: “Pandl owned acclaimed Bayside restaurant.” I coasted my car to a stop at the corner of Lake Drive and Brown Deer Road and looked over at the building. Inside, brunch preparations were being made. Through the windows, I saw waitstaff shifting and setting tables. Billy, the dishwasher, was picking up the parking lot. The world was still spinning. Wind kicked dry leaves across the road as I headed south, and sunlight danced around brown, red, and gold. I felt oddly disconnected, like I didn’t belong, like a party crasher. Something was missing. George, of course, but there was something else too. I rolled down the window, held my arm out, and let the breeze sweep through my finger
s. Then it dawned on me: the daughter. She was gone too. She had drawn her last breath and disappeared into the past along with her father. I was somebody else.

  Walking into St. Hedwig’s, I dunked my finger in the holy water font and blessed myself, in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen. I took my place in a pew toward the back and closed my eyes.

  “I’ll be here.” That’s what my father had said to me when we finally did get our tender moment. I was sitting on his bed, holding his hand and trying to keep a stiff upper lip. The only words I could summon were, “I’m sure gonna miss you, Dad.” He tightened his grip, gave my hand a little tug, smiled, and said, “I’ll be here. I’ll be here.”

  That was it. Simple.

  Three little words.

  Three and a half, really.

  He was right.

  Afterword

  Shortly before the completion of this book, on Sunday, November 15, 2009, Pandl’s in Bayside was closed. The last meal served was indeed a brunch. The 8825 North Lake Drive location is now home to a synagogue. The celebration continues.

  Shalom.

  Acknowledgments

  To Dan Lazar, a million and one thanks for finding this book, for loving it, and for holding my hand throughout this whole process. To Chuck Adams and the entire team at Algonquin, thank you for believing in me, and George, for giving our story an opportunity to flourish and for having faith in a beginner.

  Many thanks to Daniel Goldin and Lanora Haradon for giving this book two wonderful places to call home from the start.