When my sister and II first learned of Bobby's illness it seemed incomprehensible. Could it be happening to our baby brother--that boy so blond and boisterous, that man so handsome, funny, smart, and exasperating? From the moment he was born and lasting until his adolescence, Bobby and I were passionately attached. He was my trophy. My baby brother. Smart and beautiful with corn silk hair and wide, blue eyes.
And yet, even then his energy level and lack of restraint both pleased and mystified me. There was a perplexing blend of exuberance and desperation in his insistence on attention. His crooked smile suggested that at any moment his act could shift from comedy to tragedy. His sisters had been trained in New England restraint and rather than join in his robust celebration of being alive, we became his audience.
We didn't know then that this was the first step we would take away from him. He demanded attention, we hoped for it. He talked, he danced, he sang and joked, we watched and listened. Our no-elbows-on-the-table, no-talking-with-your-mouth-full, no-rude-conversations dinner table became his arena. I was both delighted by and critical of his cutting up. I was admiring of and frightened by his flying in the face of the unspoken rules of my home and community that one be self-effacing and understated. He was Henry James's European visiting Massachusetts. We were Massachusetts. He was Woody Allen come to dine. We were Annie Hall's family.
As he matured, Bobby went from dazzling light into shadow. In adolescence he became a "Jesus Freak," joined a Christian awareness group, and aspired to speak in tongues, a language his family wouldn't understand. He was beginning to give form to his sense of strangeness in our midst.
Yet there was something raw about his pain that made us avert our eyes. A family hinged on reserve could be unnerved by the chaos of emotion. Sorrow was dirty. Suffering was embarrassing in the way that death is embarrassing to children. There is fear of contagion.
By the end of his senior year in high school, Bobby informed our parents that he had fallen in love with a 21-year-old medical student. We were delighted. At last he had reentered our orbit; then I was informed that the medical student was a man. Back into the shadows. Now, as well as being more outspoken, more energetic, more joyful, and more tormented than the rest of us, he was our polar opposite.
By the time he announced that he was dropping out of college to move to New Orleans, where homosexuality was less stigmatized, there was little left for us to talk about. By then I had my own baby and Bobby was moved aside for new passions. Our few visits and phone conversations were forced. All we seemed to have in common was the blood that ran through our veins.
On the other hand, there were times when he would try to become exactly the person he thought I wanted him to be. He would speak of finally settling down to a career choice. Of being monogamous. Of doing good work in the community. He spoke of returning to college. Even as I nodded, we both knew that he lied. Bobby liked to lie. He thought facts made a richer brew if generous heapings of fantasy were added. By the time he stirred it up, it was enticing but dangerous to drink.
As he grew older I began to find his lies off-putting. More and more I felt that when I reached out to grab hold of Bobby, all I got was a handful of flimsy costume. There came a point when I didn't even want to answer his phone calls for fear of the false accent I would respond to as though it were completely normal. No one in my family had ever said to another living person, "Cut the crap."
By his late twenties he was calling and visiting less. There were months when he would drop out of sight. If my husband and I became concerned and called, a recorded message would say, "This phone has been disconnected." Letters would be returned, "Addressee Unknown." For the last 10 years of his life, even when we were in contact, Bobby was our "Addressee Unknown."
As I began to read the first reports of AIDS, I warned Bobby even as I knew that he would pay no heed. He had embraced recklessness as a lifestyle. I engaged in the old do-as-I-tell-you-so-that-I-may-love-you routine. When it was clear that his profligacy did not abate, I turned from him as if to say, "Okay, if you're going to kill yourself, I'll abandon you first." As though anger could replace love and insulate me against the pain of the fate toward which he seemed stubbornly propelled. Now I experience the worst of all pains: the knowledge that it is too late to remedy failed love.
But what did we know of grief? When you are new to grief, you learn that there's no second-guessing it. It will have its way with you. Don't be fooled by the statistics you read: Grief doesn't read timetables. One morning, three weeks after Bobby died, I arose feeling happy and energetic. Well now, I thought, I guess we've taken care of that. Wrong. The next morning I was awakened by a wail I thought was coming from the storm outside until I realized it was coming from me.
Grief will fool you with its disguises. Some days you insist that you're fine, you're just angry at a friend who said the wrong thing at the wrong time. Months after Bobby's death, my mother wept as she prepared breakfast. When my father asked, "Are you all right?" she said, "Yes, of course. I always cry when I poach eggs." You learn that you can cry and stop and laugh and even follow a taxi driver's command to "Have a nice day"--and then cry again.
Tags:
AIDS,
annie hall,
awareness group,
baby brother,
death,
elbows,
energy level,
family,
grief,
homosexuality,
insistence,
strangeness,
tongues,
unspoken rules,
woody allen
