Wild and Precious Life

by Deborah Ziegler

  Donna responded:

  What you and Britt are going through is literally mind-bending, an awful reality to comprehend, absorb and deal with. Regroup. Give yourself some room to breathe. To relish the months of joys you have shared. To mourn.

  Sarah responded:

  I have been thinking about you and feeling so badly for the maelstrom you are living in. I am so sorry for her as well, as even though she can contain herself while her friends are around for short periods, she is obviously unable to regulate her emotions at all and must be living in a very angry place. Let Gary take care of you!

  I left early the next day. I was crying as I tiptoed past Britt’s closed bedroom door. I cried all the way to the airport as Gary drove.

  “Deb. Brittany told me last night that she has the entire next month booked with one friend after another. Maudie is just the first of a parade of guests,” he said.

  “She never told me about this.” I looked out at the traffic inching along.

  “Part of you getting kicked out is that she needs our rooms for the Brittany Bed-and-Breakfast. It’ll be good for you to get away from your role as proprietor, head cook, and personal laundry service for the parade of guests.”

  “It is hard work,” I whispered.

  “Well, Amber is coming for almost a week, followed by four other friends.”

  “This is already arranged?” I asked in surprise. At least Britt would be in better spirits with guests her own age.

  “Yes. Sweetie, you need to go home and let Britt have a month of visiting friends. You’ve been holding down the fort long enough.”

  24

  Free Bird

  2011, Age Twenty-Seven

  Birds have wings; they’re free; they can fly where they want when they want. They have the kind of mobility many people envy.

  —Roger Tory Peterson, Field Guide to Birds of Eastern and Central North America

  Everyone was in good spirits after our activity-packed “Brash” Christmas in Colorado. Brittany got a bread maker for Christmas, so she baked in domestic bliss. In late January, Britt and Cash celebrated a year of togetherness.

  Brittany was recommended for a ten-month Fulbright grant and review by Nepal’s Foreign Scholarship Board, but she decided to make her own plans. She contacted several orphanages, and decided she would go to Kathmandu solo for four months.

  Gary and I insisted that she get an apartment in a gated, guarded building. We discussed our fears and concerns, knowing that Britt would go with or without our approval. She was a free bird and would fly where she wanted to. All we could do was encourage her to stay in safe housing.

  Brittany was gathering clothing, shoes, and donations for orphans. She solicited Cash’s help in getting these hundreds of pounds of items to Kathmandu. However, Cash was extremely busy with work and didn’t have a lot of downtime to help with the difficult shipping challenge.

  I got a sobbing phone call from Brittany. “Momma, Cash really shouted at me.”

  Every nerve in my body jangled. “Are you all right?”

  “He said, ‘Brittany, why the hell can’t you just be happy?’ ”

  A twinge of pain twisted my heart. Gary and I had discussed this very thought so many times at dinner. How no matter what we bought her, where we took her, how much we adored her—it never satisfied her. Britt seemed unable to relax and accept that she was attractive, smart, and loved. There seemed to be a gaping maw of neediness, restlessness, and an endless process of striving for more of everything. My husband and I knew that happiness came from within; not from a mate or partner, and not from things. In her midtwenties, Britt still seemed convinced that happiness was something others could give or take away from her. She didn’t own her own happiness yet.

  “Brittany, you and Cash aren’t getting into physical fights, are you?” The level of her sorrow made me worry that she’d been struck.

  “Cash would never hit me.” Her voice cracked and she sobbed again. “But he said our relationship isn’t working. It’s over,” she wailed. I don’t think that any of Britt’s beaus had ever ended a relationship with her. She was always the one who’d called it quits. Hadn’t she felt an undercurrent of discord in the midst of all the Christmas fun? Gary and I thought we’d sensed an eddy in the audacious stream of fused energy and love that defined them as “Brash.”

  My protectiveness sprang into high gear. I found some free boxes on Craigslist, told her to call her friend Nina, and that I’d be there soon. The three of us got all her things packed up in short order. We loaded the boxes and furniture in a rental van, drove it south, and stored it in our garage, meaning that Gary would have to park his car outside. Britt and I teased him, saying that parking outside from February through June in Southern California was a real bitch.

  Brittany mourned the loss of her relationship. “I still love him,” she sobbed on my shoulder. “I’ve never had so much fun with another human being in my life.”

  I patted her back. “Our hearts don’t turn on and off like a water spigot. Naturally it’s going to hurt for a while.” I wondered if there would ever be a man who could keep things fun enough for Brittany. I worried that my child had some kind of personality disorder that kept her from ever being deeply contented. Gary and I had discussed that it would take a patient man to live with Britt. Naturally, we never once thought that Britt’s inability to be happy—her “no filter” style of communication; her tactless style of blurting out hurtful comments; her increasing inability to empathize with those she loved, while at the same time feeling deep compassion for the charitable causes of perfect strangers or injured animals—might be the result of a brain tumor.

  While she mourned, she also packed her days with activity. There were only a few weeks to survive heartache before she was on a plane bound for Kathmandu. Britt shopped for expedition-weight cargos and boots. She booked a two-week trek on the Annapurna Circuit and leased a secure apartment.

  On March 1, 2011, Britt flew out of LAX, and Gary and I began a three-month period of nonstop worry and prayer for her safety. We kept Bella for a while, until Dan picked her up.

  We knew that Britt was still in contact with Cash, so it was a little surprising to see Dan reappear. As he drove away with the dog, Gary said, “I’ve got a feeling Dan just got a toe back in the door.”

  Britt started a blog to keep us advised about her travels in Kathmandu: http://brittanygoestonepal.blogspot.com/.

  She was struck by the love and life in such poverty, the pitiful beggars eking out an existence from garbage, darting in and out of traffic. She explored the city, paraglided in Kathmandu Valley, and got food poisoning twice, the second time when she was trekking on the Annapurna. The hike involved difficult trails, jungles, rice paddies, and snowcapped mountains. She explored small villages and survived a freak snowstorm as well as an avalanche.

  Something she wrote on her blog makes me incredibly sad to read today:

  A couple of times along the trail I spotted couples in their 60’s and 70’s taking their time to explore a new area. How amazing to be trekking and traveling at that age . . . I certainly hope that my future husband and I will be the type of couple that treks through Asia at any age on holiday.

  After her trek, Britt volunteered in the Bal Mandir Orphanage, which housed over two hundred children and lacked adequate staff and supplies. The babies’ room consisted of rows of cribs tended by only a few women. Toddlers walked around unclothed and unsupervised. Britt spent hours holding and feeding the babies. She also jumped off the world’s tallest bridge swing in a one-hundred-meter free fall. On April 18, she wrote:

  Living here in Nepal . . . and getting to know so many amazingly resilient children has been the best experience in my life. Despite their various tragedies, they have such capacity for joy.

  April 29, Britt summed up her trip:

  Hey mom . . . love you, miss you. Thank you for loving me so much as a child, protecting me from harm, and teaching me about the value of compassion f
or others. You were always a model of tolerance; standing up for what is right, compassion, and love.

  My complicated, sometimes maddening daughter had been looking for love throughout her twenties. Brittany was a marrying kind of girl. She wanted children, which was so crystal clear to me and Gary that we bought a home with grandchildren in mind, with a pool and room for them to visit comfortably.

  As I communicated with my passionate girl, I realized that she was still searching for a man to love. She was looking for someone to love her just as she was, to make her happy. In looking for love, she had become a citizen of the world. Brittany had opened her heart to the underdog. She championed those who were judged, spurned, or held in contempt because they were different. I was proud of any part I’d had in creating an environment for her heart to grow and expand.

  On May 5, Brittany left Kathmandu for Thailand with another young volunteer from the orphanage. Britt visited several cities and went on two open water dives, but the most vivid stories were about volunteering at a Thailand elephant sanctuary.

  The elephant refuge was run by a British charity. My daughter became an assistant to a mahout (elephant keeper) for six days a week. She bathed and washed her charges in the river each day and cleaned their enclosures. Britt paid a modest fee to cover her housing and food, and shared a bungalow with her new friend. Each day they woke at 6:30 a.m. to harvest pineapples, corn, bananas, or sugarcane, chopping and dragging the fodder for some distance. The elephants captured Brittany’s heart. She loved the soulful way they looked at people, and she never tired of watching them use their trunks to grasp things.

  Brittany arrived home exhausted and feeling torn about what she wanted to do next. We left almost immediately for a family getaway in Montecito, California. There she started combing the Internet for a teaching job anywhere in California, but the nonexistent job market created by school budget cuts continued. In fact, teachers with no tenure were being laid off in droves. Britt decided to study for the LSAT and get an apartment in Oceanside, not too far from our home. She found a roommate to share expenses, and they landed an apartment with a view of the Pacific Ocean. Bella would remain with Dan because dogs weren’t allowed.

  That summer, Britt managed to study hard, schedule some diving excursions, date another handful of guys, and take up paddleboarding. On September 4, she did an impromptu skydive.

  Britt took her first LSAT test and scored in the ninetieth percentile. She was disappointed in the score, even though full scholarship offers started rolling in from a handful of the fourteen law schools she’d applied to. One has to wonder what her score would have been without a brain tumor.

  Brittany also filled out paperwork to take my maiden name, Ziegler. She was ready to let go of her former name forever. Together we planned a trip to Greece, a mother-daughter adventure. I organized every single minute of this trip with such hope of reconnecting with my daughter, and deep longing for Britt to discover that happiness was a choice that only she could make. I hoped that this trip would help my daughter face the question that was clearly tormenting her. She had a bachelor’s and master’s degree, and yet no fulfilling job, or even an idea of what to do besides teach—which would require a move out of state. What was she going to do with her life? How was she going to support herself? Was a career in law a good fit?

  We flew to Greece on the very day a new government was formed. My mum called me at the airport as we waited for our flight. “Cancel the trip. There’s too much unrest. You’re buying into Brittany’s unsafe travel patterns.”

  “We’re going to Greece, not Somalia. We’ll be perfectly safe. Love you. Gotta go.”

  We checked into our room in Athens at twilight. The man at the desk told us to call Gary immediately, and we rolled our eyes at each other. Worrywart Gary had probably heard about the strikes and unrest.

  When we opened the French doors on our balcony, our exhaustion faded along with the memory of the reminder to call Gary. There, lit up against an inky Greek sky, on Acropolis Hill, was the Parthenon, the most dramatic, sacred, eerie sight I’d ever seen. Britt and I exhaled sounds of appreciation.

  “I booked dinner on the roof.” I looked at her, and we smiled.

  The phone rang. I ran for it as Brittany said, “We forgot to call Gary.”

  “Gary. Oh my god, the Parthenon. It’s so close, we can almost touch it. It’s all lit up!” I wouldn’t let my husband get a word in edgewise. “We’re just about to go eat dinner on the roof.”

  Britt lingered on the terrace and I stared at the temple even as I heard Gary say, “Deb, your mother was killed in a car accident. You and Brittany need to come home. I tried to catch you in Paris, but—”

  The phone fell from my hand. I sank to the floor and curled in a fetal position on the carpet. I remember thinking, What in the hell was that horrible noise? “No . . . no . . . no!”

  Brittany had the phone. “Gary, we can’t turn around and catch the first flight out. Momma needs a good night’s rest. Wait, someone’s at the door.”

  From the floor I saw Brittany answer the door, and a man was asking, “Is everything all right?”

  “We just got some very bad news. Give us a minute.”

  I was sure that he’d heard the same ghastly noise that I had . . . that howling, screaming woman.

  Britt came over, phone in hand, and bent down. “Momma! Breathe. Stop that noise. We’re going to get kicked out of our room.”

  It slowly dawned on me that I was the source of the awful noise. I put my hand over my mouth. “Never speak badly of your mother,” I said. “I wish I’d never said anything negative about her.”

  “Can you talk to Gary?” She handed me the phone.

  “We’ll take a flight out tomorrow afternoon. Mum is dead. Getting on the next flight out will not change that. We need to rest.” I hung up. A series of phone calls came. My brother. My sisters.

  “Britt,” I said, “Can you get us to Dallas? I’m not thinking clearly.”

  “No worries, Momma. I got this. But no regrets. You were good to your mother, and she was a royal bitch sometimes.”

  “No regrets,” I said softly.

  We flew to Dallas for the funeral, and afterward I brought my father back to California to live with me.

  Britt celebrated Thanksgiving with her grandpa at my house, and then took off just days later for Tokyo, Singapore, Laos, and Vietnam. She was meeting the same girl that had traveled with her to the elephant refuge. I simply couldn’t worry. I had my ninety-year-old father to care for, and it was becoming apparent to Gary that I was sinking under this weight. We were looking at assisted living care centers.

  Both my father and I were deeply depressed. He was hard to rouse from bed. Although my mother had been difficult, it hadn’t diminished my love for her. My mind kept revisiting her body being thrown from the car. Had she been conscious? She had not been dead on arrival. Did that mean she had suffered?

  I could only take it one day at a time, and meanwhile pray for Brittany’s safety.

  Brittany ran a marathon through ninety-degree Angkor Wat. The locals stood and watched the crazy Americans run in the sweltering heat. On December 1, Britt posted a selfie with a snake around her neck. She called to tell us that she rode bikes with her friend through rural Laos, and then hiked into a huge cave where there were no other people. Gary lost his temper and said, “There is adventuresome, and there is downright stupid. This falls in the latter category.” It was a short phone call. Britt’s last words were something along the lines of she didn’t care what we said; it was one of the most exquisitely beautiful days of her life.

  From Laos, Brittany traveled alone to Vietnam. Her itinerary: Vientiane to Pakse to Ho Chi Minh to Nha Trang to Ha Long Bay to Hanoi.

  My father was waking in the middle of the night and dragging furniture from his room into the hall. Gary and I were at our wits’ end, and had terrible backaches from trying to assist him in and out of the bath.

  Brittany was causing
a level of worry that we couldn’t even fathom. She had booked a week on a junk in Ha Long Bay, in which she’d be the only passenger with an all-male crew. Brittany sipped Vietnamese coffee as the captain skillfully threaded the junk between towering limestone islands covered in jungle vegetation. She swam off the side of the boat and feasted on a fresh seafood meal prepared just for her. Later she described the pure joy she felt as she explored grottos in a small bamboo boat.

  When she came home, I felt like kissing the ground.

  The next thing I knew, Brittany made plans to meet with Dan and Bella. They decided to spend New Year’s weekend in Sonoma Valley wine country.

  Gary couldn’t suppress his grin. “Told you Bella was a way to keep in touch.”

  25

  Pre-Grief Is a Nasty Bitch

  September 2014

  I don’t care how hard being together is, nothing is worse than being apart.

  —Josephine Angelini, Starcrossed

  Separated from Brittany, I cried many times each day. I didn’t care what I wore or what I looked like. I didn’t attempt to hide my grief. My face was etched with pain; my feelings were raw, naked, and exposed. Complete strangers asked if I was all right, provoking an outburst of tears. “No, I’m not, but there’s nothing anyone can do to help me.”

  Every muscle in my body ached. I told myself to grieve, get it out of my system, so that I could go back to Oregon and be the mother my daughter needed me to be. The sorrow, the well of tears, and the agony of knowing what was coming . . . endless. Wave after wave of excruciating pain knocked me down as soon as I wobbled to my feet. I wanted to throw myself into it, drown in it. I wanted grief to kill me, and some days I thought it might.

  I couldn’t concentrate, couldn’t remember names of people that I knew well, couldn’t sleep. The dream about Britt inserting the knife into my torso was on a repeat cycle, haunting me several times a week.

  My therapist told me that I must not expect an apology. He asked me to remember the last time that Brittany apologized, and I couldn’t. It had been years.