Letter from my Father

by Dasia Black

  I was exceedingly nervous just before the ceremony, when along with Betty and Stan, we were ushered into the small room at the back of the synagogue where we signed the necessary documents. But once under the wedding canopy, I calmed down as I watched Jonathan and Paula, both looking splendid, being married.

  Paula had organised a beautiful and elegant wedding reception. Oval tables decorated with white flowers filled a room in a gracious old home, now a reception centre. There was a view through French windows to a well-tended garden and a lively band and dancing. Some 120 people, friends and family, wished the young couple the best for the future.

  My mother looked a bit grim, but I later learned that this was a particular feature of the Parkinson’s disease from which she suffered in her later years. A typical symptom is that people’s faces freeze, so they appear not to be expressing emotion. I was also a little disappointed in Henry. On the way home from the wedding party, I was still excited and couldn’t stop talking about it, while he merely commented: Yes, it was rather pleasant. I told myself that no matter how good one’s second marriage was, it was unreasonable to expect someone like Henry to feel as deeply about my son as I did. But I missed the enthusiasm. I felt lonely. My perceptive friend Susi observed the next day: I felt your loneliness, how you carried it all yourself.

  When we got home, we found a lengthy note from Jonathan on the kitchen table, in his inimitable scribble. It was an expression of gratitude for my love and support, and hope for a good future for all of us.

  On the following Monday night, I woke at 3 am feeling wretched, as if a deep root had been torn out of my heart. I suppose it was the separation from my youngest son, to which I now would have to adjust.

  The next year, 1991 was emotionally tumultuous for me. Jonathan and Paula had moved into his flat and were busily preparing to go to the United States at the beginning of the following year. Since they would be away for at least three years, I wanted to have as many family occasions as possible while they were still in Sydney. Nena, as the boys and their wives called my mother, also worried about her innocent (as she called him) grandson going off to another continent. She wondered aloud whether she would live long enough to see him again.

  A couple of months after the wedding, I was preparing for Passover Seder, the celebration of the liberation of the Jewish people from bondage in Egypt. I wanted to make it very special, since this would be the last Seder before Jonathan and Paula’s departure for overseas. Then they suddenly informed me that they were going camping over this period and so would not attend. When I explained to them that they would need to tell Nena this themselves, since I did not want to be involved with the devastating effect it would have on her, they changed their minds and stayed.

  I was aware how sensitive I was to the slightest indication of a threat to the closeness of my tiny family.

  XV

  A Changing Family

  Most Friday nights I prepared lavish dinners, deeply satisfied to have Simon and Ruth, three-year-old Zak and twelve-month-old Nathan, and now Jonathan and Paula also sitting around my table. Sometimes Kim joined in to make these worthwhile occasions for Henry and Nena, who was nourished by them.

  In September, we were informed that Jonathan and Paula were expecting a baby the following April, and Simon and Ruth their third child in March. Jonathan was not only thrilled at the prospect of his very own baby but also that his child would be an American citizen. He or she was due a couple of months after their arrival in the United States.

  I squealed with delight when they told me. Soon I would have four grandchildren. My mother and I shared our joy of these events.

  I did, however, experience a great deal of anxiety about Jonathan and Paula’s departure overseas and general anxiety, the cause of which I could not pinpoint. I realised how irrational my feelings were. During the days that Henry spent with me in Sydney, he was exposed to my unease. I also noticed that Henry did not seem his normal vigorous self, but attended to this less than I should have.

  None of this deterred us from making travel plans for the next year, that eventful year of 1992. I had been granted a four-month sabbatical and the plan was that in February, I would go to McGill University in Montreal for two months to work on a research project. After this, I would cross the border to the U.S. to welcome my grandchild and stay for a while with Paula and Jonathan as a helper. Paula’s mother would then take over from me in the mothers’ relay. The parents-to-be told us how much they appreciated this.

  Henry would join me when his business commitments allowed. His Swiss cousin had arranged for us to rent a converted mill in Provence in May, when this intoxicating part of the world was at its best. Genuinely relaxing in Provence with my husband, who so delighted in frivolity and lightness, seemed within my reach.

  As I would be separated from Henry for a period the following year, we decided to spend part of our summer holiday swimming, snorkelling and hiking at Rarotonga, the capital of the Cook Islands. We wanted to go to a place with a different culture and Henry picked these lush Pacific Islands, with their volcanic soil, tropical vegetation, splendid beaches, peaceful little villages and friendly people.

  The return flights to the islands required us to change airlines in Auckland. We had been put on a wait list for the Auckland to Rarotonga leg of the trip since the flights were full due to many Cook Islanders working in New Zealand going home for the Christmas period. I found waiting to secure our booking quite unsettling. I phoned the travel agent every couple of days. Henry told me to relax. But I seemed quite obsessed with making this holiday happen.

  On 7th December, four days before we were due to depart, the missing leg still unconfirmed, we heard breaking news about Hurricane Val. Dubbed the storm of the century, this severe tropical cyclone reaching 240 kilometres per hour had hit Samoa and was heading for the Cook Islands.

  The travel agent advised us to be ready to fly on the set date, but not to be disappointed if all flights to and from the islands were cancelled at a moment’s notice. Meanwhile we listened to every broadcast about the route the cyclone was blasting for itself. On 11th December our travel agent informed us that we could take our flight to Auckland, since there had been cancellations for the flight to Rarotonga. She warned us, however, that when we got to New Zealand, it might be unsafe to fly on. Because of the extreme conditions, we could get our money refunded if we chose not to proceed with the trip.

  Henry, adventurer that he was, was happy to risk it and set out. I agreed. I could not account for my single-minded pursuit of this holiday. It was as if the little girl in me had set her heart on it.

  Just before boarding our plane at Sydney airport, Henry disappeared to make a phone call to his doctor. He casually mentioned that he wanted to find out the results of some tests and discuss his intermittent high blood pressure. Don’t worry, he told me.

  After some delays, we finally did get to Rarotonga. Our hotel had the typical low wooden huts, a dining room open to a swimming pool surrounded by a wide deck with comfortable deck chairs under huge umbrellas and vibrant landscaped gardens. The locals spoke a type of Pidgin English, which Henry took to immediately, having learned a similar dialect in Papua New Guinea. He beamed. Together we relaxed, walking along the beach in the evenings and gazing in wonder at the star-studded sky.

  By our third day, Henry was debating with himself whether he should go for a fairly shallow scuba-dive or a much deeper, more challenging one. Scuba-diving was one of his passions. He had described the magical stillness and sheer beauty and diversity of the living creatures in the underwater world. It was his natural habitat, he said.

  He returned from his day out deep diving enchanted, but that night and the subsequent ones I noticed that the sound of his snoring had changed. It was louder and more raucous than ever. I felt as if I were sleeping next to a roaring lion. I woke him every few minutes to tell him to stop and let me sleep. But as soon as he fell asleep it would start again.

  One morning we went
to a secluded beach with the whitest sand I had ever seen. Henry disappeared with his snorkel while I swam and then chatted to a couple sitting on the beach in deck-chairs. A large deep blue starfish had just been washed up on the shore, they said. I had never seen one as big as this. We wondered whether it could survive the heat of the sun.

  I waved to Henry, who had emerged from the water to come and admire this solitary creature. He approached and started poking and hitting it with a stick he picked up. He seemed furious. The other couple retreated, leaving me embarrassed, perplexed and, yes, frightened of this savage behaviour from my civilised husband. What was happening?

  Henry spent the rest of the holiday reading, swimming and sleeping a lot. Only occasionally did he display his usual good humour and zest. While I swam, alone most of the time, a phrase kept repeating itself in my mind: It will be all right. I can stand on my own two feet. One wonders at the workings of the unconscious, because I did not perceive any danger to my and Henry’s relationship – so what did on my own two feet mean? On our flight back to Sydney we were both somewhat subdued.

  XVI

  Shock, Grief, Survival

  On our return from the Cook Islands, Henry drove to Canberra to spend Christmas with his mother and Kim. A week later he came back and we set off to Pearl Beach for a week’s holiday at a summer cottage lent to us by good friends. Henry and I loved this place and had enjoyed some glorious summer days there. A gentle 500 metres from the beach, the house had sliding glass windows, wide verandas front and back and overlooked a slightly overgrown, luxurious sub-tropical garden. It was a place for reading, yarning with friends over a glass of red wine, being quiet and – yes, for lovemaking.

  On this holiday, however, some strange things happened. Henry had previously been effortlessly able to swim from one end of the bay to the other. One day I was sitting on a rock on the south side of the beach and, with some pride, told a man also there of my husband’s swimming prowess. We watched Henry’s steady slow strokes as he made his way towards us, and I expected him then to turn round and swim back out to sea. Instead he waded out of the water. He was not being my hero. I immediately asked him why he’d given up. He just mumbled about his snorkel.

  That afternoon during our usual pre-dinner walk, Henry turned to me and said: I want you to understand that if anything happens to me, I don’t want to live on in a diminished state. I quickly started talking about his mother and her enjoyment of life in spite of her failing powers, but he interrupted forcefully: It’s important for me that you understand what I’m saying. I, reproved, replied: I do hear and understand you.

  He was also taking his pulse regularly and when I asked why, he just replied: Oh, I’m just checking that I’m still alive.

  In preparation for the evening’s barbecue on New Year’s Eve 1991, I had marinated snapper fillets bought that morning at the fishing village of Patonga and made a crisp green salad. Henry had put a couple of bottles of white wine in the fridge. We decided to spend the evening on our own. At dusk we walked down to the beach and strolled along it, arm in arm, while Henry slowly savoured the aroma of his pipe. It was so peaceful. The stars were out and I enjoyed every moment of our togetherness. We made our way back home, ate dinner in a leisurely manner and sipped our wine. Five minutes before midnight we turned on the radio and waited for the count-down for the New Year’s Eve toast, champagne glasses at the ready. Henry’s customary toast, one that filled my ever-anxious heart with hope, was: Here’s to a vintage year! This time the moment came but the toast did not. He said quietly: Here’s to next year. My heart faltered. I protested: Isn’t it going to be a vintage year? Henry responded even more quietly: I hope so.

  That night I woke with a start, reliving that crucial moment of the New Year. This was not my Henry.

  The next day we headed back home to meet his Swiss cousin and her friend who were visiting Sydney. He would drive them both back to Canberra. He also went to see a doctor about the shoulder he had injured while doing a handstand at Pearl Beach – or at least that’s what he told me.

  As he set off to Canberra he seemed rather fatigued. He had, of course, to pack the car with the visitors’ luggage after picking them up very early that morning at the airport. He phoned me the following Monday to ask whether he had left his blood pressure tablets in the bathroom at my townhouse. I told him he had not. A few hours later he phoned again with the same question. It was unlike him to fuss so much. But now I knew that he had high blood pressure, a fact he had hidden from me. This was probably why he had gone to see the doctor. How impossible men were!

  That evening as we spoke by phone he told me that he had a bad back and was going to a chiropractor. I strongly advised him to ask a doctor for a diagnosis. He did not heed my advice. His back pain became worse, though I found this out only indirectly from his secretary, Greta, since he refused to admit I had been right to warn him against the chiropractor. He even had another session with him. During our Tuesday night phone call, he promised me that he would see a doctor and report the next day. The following night, however, he was still procrastinating.

  Thursday was a demanding day for me, as I busily prepared university material for the person who would replace me while I was on sabbatical at McGill. I went to bed fairly early for me, around 10.30pm. Henry and I had agreed that he was not to call me after 11pm, since I woke very early every morning to go for my walk and then to work. This had taken a bit of training as Henry only truly woke up to the world around noon and went to sleep late.

  I fell into a deep sleep. At what seemed a very late hour, though it was probably only midnight, I half-heard the phone ring. I ignored it since I wanted to stay within my sleep. The ringing stopped and I continued my peaceful slumber. Then the ringing started again. Now I was awake. However, I continued to ignore it, thinking: Bloody Henry. Why can’t he stick to our agreement? I was annoyed by his lack of consideration. He knew how much I loved and needed my sleep. Whatever it was could wait until morning.

  On Friday morning, I phoned Henry in his Canberra office to get some information on obtaining a gold American Express card. He was out, but Greta was able to supply me with what I wanted. Towards the end of our conversation, Henry returned to the office and Greta asked whether I wanted to speak to him. I blithely said that there was no need since I would be seeing him in a few hours when I picked him up at the airport in Sydney to have Friday night dinner together.

  Later on I organised what we needed for dinner, set the table and went up to my study to do some work. The computer wouldn’t start. I systematically went over each of the required steps. Nothing. So frustrating. I thought that I might have to ask Jonathan, a computer wizard among his many other accomplishments, to have a look at it over the weekend.

  At 6pm, just as I was getting ready to drive to the airport for Henry’s 7pm flight, the phone rang. It was Greta. She told me that he had collapsed at the foot of the stairs leading up to his office and had been taken to hospital, most likely suffering from concussion. She said that he had not been feeling well all morning and that when she had suggested he see a doctor, had refused. He would rather go for a swim, he said, his cure for everything. She had seen his car returning but it had been a long time before she heard him open the door downstairs. Then she had heard the thud of his fall.

  She had gone down to investigate and found him collapsed in a dazed state at the bottom of the staircase. She had helped him up the stairs and, only when he agreed did she call an ambulance. She thought that I’d better fly to Canberra that very night.

  I phoned the hospital and was told that Henry was under investigation and that I should call later. I managed to find a seat on an 8.20pm flight and quickly packed my overnight bag with a change of clothes. I was feeling anxious but not alarmed. I knew concussion could be quite unpleasant, but after a few days one did recover. I then phoned the GP who had seen Henry six days earlier. He told me that he was not concerned as much about the impact of the fall as why he had fallen.
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  I phoned my friend Lydia and her surgeon husband Ron to talk to them about what was happening. They invited me over and Ron phoned Henry’s hospital and asked to speak to the physician in the Intensive Care Unit. As he listened to what he had to say, his face turned pale. He carefully put down the phone, looked at me and said: Ester, Henry has had a stroke. It looks bad.

  I heard the words. I knew what they meant but I also did not know. My friends drove me to the airport and I arranged to have Greta meet me and drive me directly to the hospital. During the flight, unsettling thoughts battered me. Did stroke mean paralysis? How much? Which parts of Henry would be affected? Was he in the best hands? What rehabilitation would he need? What was happening now? I even thought that it was a shame I had prepared such a nice dinner.

  On arrival at the hospital, a doctor took me aside and explained that Henry had suffered a haemorrhage to the left frontal lobe of his brain. He was in a deep coma. The phrase he used, irreversible brain damage, was beyond my understanding. Henry had been allotted a single room in the unit, located on the top floor of the building, with wide windows right across one wall looking out on to the blue hills surrounding Canberra. It was a splendid view – but of course Henry could not see it.

  He was lying unconscious, his face tranquil, the only sign of life his deep regular breathing as he inhaled oxygen. He had always had a strong heart. It kept on beating seemingly unaware of what had happened to the person for whom it had laboured all its life. I sat beside the bed, stunned.