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Family Dynamics
Holding the Line
Life with Margaret has always been surprising and unexpected.
Posted May 30, 2023 Reviewed by Tyler Woods
2022
It took me a day to notice my sister’s voicemail. Playing it back, I heard the buzzing landline and the drone of a talk show and assumed it was a pocket call from one of the caregivers. Then I heard her voice, flat and quiet at first.
“Hi,” she said.
Silence, the sound of her breathing, then, more plaintively, “Hi?” rising to a question.
“…not home?” someone asked, and Margaret hung up.
Phone calls are uncommon these days, and from Margaret nearly nonexistent, but I knew why she’d called. I phoned back, and she grabbed the receiver from her caregiver when she heard my voice.
We said hello. I reminded her we’d seen each other recently for Christmas. She said yes. I listed who’d been there—two brothers, our mother, one brother’s girlfriend. She said yes. I recounted our activities—brunch, presents by the tree, music, and dinner. She said yes. There was a pause, and then I asked her if she was missing Dad. She said yes again, her voice rising to that plaintive lilt.
“I miss Dad too,” I said.
“Ok!” she replied, and then in a rush, “Thank you! Love you! Goodbye!”
2020
When Dad was diagnosed, I was as far away from home as I could possibly be, on a boat in the middle of the Drake Passage. Phoning home, I repeatedly misdialed a string of numbers for the ship-to-shore call, my vision blurred by seasickness medication and my hands shaking with emotion. I reached my younger brother first, who told me about the late-stage, inoperable cancer. As the boat crept along with maddening torpor, I thought of the naval icebreaker that carried my father through these same icy waters years before I was born.
My older brother picked me up at the airport, and I knew before he said it that Dad was dead—gone an hour before I’d landed. It was so frustratingly like him to keep us all at a distance, even in this final departure. Just 18 hours into hospice care, he’d slipped away while Mom tended to a plumbing backup she was sure he’d sent to distract her.
We brought Margaret to the house, which was suddenly not our parents’ house, just Mom’s house, so we could tell her together. We sat together in the kitchen as Mom explained that Dad had been sick, and Dad had been in the hospital. Now, Dad was in heaven with Jesus. The rest of us began to weep like the children we no longer were, and Margaret laughed out loud.
Later, I found her crying alone in the living room. Her silent, terrible tears broke my heart again.
At the funeral, as the priest blessed the urn and we prepared to process into the church, Margaret squeezed Mom’s hand and said, “Dad’s feeling better?”
2021
Margaret’s behavior once drove us apart. Meltdowns disrupted every holiday and celebration, and her compulsions upended daily life. But now she was the one pulling us together.
Phone calls, once rare, became routine. She used Facetime, trying siblings at random, her smile blooming when one of us answered.
Previously truant from holidays, now we were expected and reminded in advance.
On the fourth of July, she woke me at sunrise—joyful, naked, and ready for help in the shower.
At Thanksgiving, she said, “Well, there’s Eileen!” and crossed the room to hug me.
On Christmas night, she lingered at the back door, hollering, “Thank you for coming!” though she was the one leaving.
2022
We’re worried Mom might be sick, so Margaret can’t see her.
Her caregivers say she’s pacing the house, saying, “Mom’s sick? Mom’s in the hospital?” Surely, she’s wondering if Mom’s on her way to heaven with Jesus too.
On Facetime, she looks tired and sad. It’s been two years since Dad died, and this sorrowful anniversary is now logged in her heart’s calendar. She doesn’t say much, and I don’t know what to say. She cheers up after seeing Mom’s face, one brother reports.
Summer comes, and we can gather again. Unexpected gifts: Margaret’s low chuckle as I drive her home. Margaret bursting into song and powering through every stanza of “King of the Road.” Her belly laugh at some joke she can’t articulate. The rest of us don’t understand completely, but we laugh along with her. This is how we’ve always shared her joy.
And on the horizon, the future we all pretend not to think about. One day Mom will leave us too, and we’ll gather at the house to tell Margaret she’s gone. The fragments of our collective childhood will turn to ash and blow away forever.
What will we say to her? Words will fail us, but words always have. We’ll try anyway, like we have for half a lifetime. We’ll try, knowing that our failure is part of loving each other. And we’ll keep trying every chance we get.
