This Day, Last Year

It’s noon as I write this. Where was he at noon last year? Was he riding his bike at this very moment? Was he at the local community pool, playing on the diving board? Was he out on a four-wheeler, tearing around the back yard? Was he running out into the street to retrieve a baseball? Was he a passenger in his family’s car, going through an intersection on the green light?

I don’t know the details

Was he already in the ambulance, with an EMT putting in the first catheter and inserting a trach tube? Had he already arrived at the hospital, surrounded by doctors and nurses in a desperate attempt to save his life? Was he on life support in CCU, while doctors searched for any spark of life to appear on his EEG and his parents waited silently at the doorway?

I don’t know the details.

Was he a Scout? Did he visit the local rest home at Christmas time to deliver cards and sing carols? Had he just been through his Bar Mitzvah, and was now taking his place with the adults of his synagogue? Did he help his dad with the yard work and his mom with the dusting? Did he have a sister that he teased mercilessly but defended like a little tiger if anyone else did? Did he ever come home from school and tell his parents, “They talked about organ donation today in school, and I want to do that”? What was it that led his parents to make the decision they did, when all hope vanished?

I don’t know the details.

This was the day before Memorial Day last year. The day before the day set aside for remembering heroes, for remembering the fallen. Are the parents reliving last year’s grief today, playing this same hour-by-hour game in their heads? “It’s twelve o’clock, and he was doing this; it’s one o’clock, and he was doing that; it’s six o’clock, and we’d lost him.” Will they relive it yet again this Sunday, the day before the day we remember those who died for others? Has their decision brought them any peace? What is it like for them, on this first anniversary?

I don’t know the details.

And you, the would-be voice of conscience, who sits on my shoulder and whispers into my ear that I should be more forgiving of children, more tolerant of their misdeeds because children should not be reared in apartments, and because the parents are at fault…

You, who would chide me because I am not a mother, not an aunt, and have not extended the hand of friendship to a child…

You, who imply my arrogance by reminding me that a child donated the liver that gave me life, giving you cause to feel that I am somehow unworthy of it because I have then used this new lease on life to condemn the misbehavior of other children…

You, who believe you know the whole of my mind because I choose to make public select musings and vignettes…

Be gone to whatever shadow you emerged from and bother me no more. I have my own personal demons to haunt my thoughts, and have no use for the sanctimonious hauntings of others.

You don’t know the details.