Hearts Of Nepal Collection

Chapter 8

In the depths of sleep, John heard a soft ringing, growing steadily until his eyes opened. He lay a second in the dark, coming to himself, then groped for the phone on the nightstand beside his bed. Something hit the floor in the process, click-clacking as it rolled away. Blinking at the blurred number flashing on the screen, he answered.

“John, it’s Peg,” his sister said. Her voice was jittery and rushed.

“Yeah, I see that.” He pulled the phone away from his ear and looked at the time. 2:00 a.m. “You know I’m twelve hours ahead of you, right?”

“John, listen to me. It’s Mom. She’s had a stroke.”

It took a moment for the words to register. He’d just spoken with his mother not two days ago, enduring fifty minutes of the latest gossip about Oak Creek’s mucky-mucks. He sat up. “Stroke? What the hell you talking about? When?”

“This morning. I found her on the floor when I came to take her grocery shopping. I’ve been in the hospital ever since.” She paused and he heard her take a shaky breath. “John, she’s in the ICU and she’s not good. Can you come home?”

“Umm…yeah, yeah. I’ll…I’ll book a flight as soon as I can,” he said, trying to wrap his head around this whirlwind that had just blown into his life. All at once, his world narrowed into one focused point. His mother. He tried to think, but it was like swimming in molasses.

“John, John you there?” Peg said.

“Yeah…I was just trying to sort things out,” he said, scrambling to get control of the situation. He raked his fingers through his hair, adding the flight hours and subtracting a day. But his math depended on a perfect world where everything ran smoothly. In Nepal, things ran on their own time and sometimes, no time at all. At last, he said, “If I can make the flight out of Pokhara to Kat, I can make the Hong Kong to Denver leg this afternoon and get to you by six tomorrow morning your time.”

“Okay. When you get flight numbers and times, let me know and I’ll have Mom’s girlfriend, Helen, pick you up at the airport.”

John leaned over and reached to the foot of the bed for his prosthetic. As he dragged it next to him, he said, “I’ll call you when I hit Hong Kong. I should know my ETA then.”

“Sounds good. And John…”

“Yeah?”

“Hurry.”

Frazzled, John ended the call, threw a change of clothing and a few incidentals into his day-pack and got dressed. First thing was to check his credit card balance and find a flight. He booted his laptop up and logged onto his account. Thirty-two hundred and change, more than enough to get home. Next, he searched for a flight to Kat. He groaned. Even if he got to Kat with three hours to spare, the circuslike atmosphere at Tribhuvan International Airport guaranteed he’d need a minor miracle to make the trans-Pacific connection to San Francisco.

He scrolled down the list of departure times on Buddha Airline’s website and found a flight leaving at 7:37 a.m., arriving in Kathmandu at 8:05 a.m. Dragon Airlines—a partner with Cathay-Pacific—had a flight leaving for Hong Kong out of Kathmandu at 11:15 p.m. It was a super tight connection, considering he was going to have to switch terminals—if you could call Tribhuvan’s antiquated masonry building a terminal.

At 6:30 a.m., John’s taxi pulled up to the front entry of Pokhara’s regional airport. He paid the driver, grabbed his day pack and got out to hoof it into the crowded terminal that was humming with tourists and trekkers heading to Kathmandu, Jomsom, and Manang. As he waited in a long queue to get his boarding pass, he pulled his phone out and dialed his sister. Although he’d said he’d call her in Hong Kong, he had to know if anything had changed with their mother. After giving her his flight itinerary, he pressed her for news and found out Mom had stabilized—at least for the time being—but the doctors cautioned against hope for a recovery. A CT scan revealed another embolism deep within the temporal lobe that was inoperable.

John’s shoulders sagged after he hung up. His mother was going to die. This was impossible! The thought of her not being in the world was incomprehensible. He felt untethered and suddenly adrift in his own life, and it frightened him. Until now, he’d always considered himself independent and in control. But now, life had jumped the tracks. Esther May Patterson, retired school bus driver, librarian for Oak Creek Elementary, church deacon, and everyone’s favorite mother was going to die. It was as if someone had ripped his guts out, and he found it hard to breathe as he stepped ahead in line.

The runway of Denver International Airport raced up beneath John’s passenger window. Remarkably, the travel gods had smiled on him and he’d been able to make his connection in Kathmandu to Hong Kong with five minutes to spare. Now, twenty-one hours later, he was back in the States, feeling as if he’d been dragged through a knothole. When the plane made the gate, he collected his daypack from the overhead compartment and waited with his phone glued to his ear as the passengers deplaned onto the jetway.

“I’m down,” he said to his sister. “How’s Mom?”

“Hanging in there. How was the flight?”

“Long. At least I didn’t get hung up at customs. Is my ride here?” Having never met Helen or, for that matter, any of his mother’s girfriends since he’d taken the job with Andersen eighteen years ago in pursuit of his dreams, he asked what the woman looked like.

“Helen should be waiting at baggage. She has shoulder-length brown hair, oversized glasses, and she’s wearing a bright red sweater. I gave her a sign with your name on it so you should be able to find her pretty easily.”

“Okay, I’ll be there as quick as I can,” he said, following the moving passengers off the plane. “See you in forty-five.”

He ended the call and marched past the deplaning passengers into the bustling, carpeted concourse. The escalators leading to the baggage claim on the ground floor were several gates down the long sprawling terminal. Slinging his daypack over his shoulder, he made a beeline toward them, weaving in and out of the sea of humanity. Suddenly, he was rushing forward, faster than he should on his prosthetic and he would’ve taken a tumble had he not caught himself at the last minute on one of the large round columns stretching to the terminal’s vaulted ceiling. Clinging to its smooth metal surface, he huffed as people darted glances his way.

God damn it!

God damn it!He sucked a breath and forced himself onward to the escalator leading to the baggage claim. Stepping onto it, he peered down over the rail, searching for a woman with a red sweater and a sign among the scattered crowds heading for their destinations. He found her standing on the fringe of the baggage carousels. When she saw him coming down the escalator, she raised her sign.

“You’d be John, I assume,” she said after he made his way to her.

“Yep, Helen?” John said, catching a faint hint of a British accent.

She held her hand out. “Pleased to meet you. Tell you what: I’ll go fetch my car while you collect your luggage.”

John shook his head. “No need to. Got it right here,” he said, patting the daypack on his shoulder. “Let’s go.”

Helen steered her lime-green Ford Focus past the line of waiting taxis and security vehicles in front of the entry terminal. As she went, John stared out his passenger-side window, barely noticing the idling cars dropping off or picking up friends and family from their flights. Five minutes later, they were motoring down Pena Boulevard to the 470 expressway with her giving him a rundown of her friendship with his mother, telling him how they’d met and what a good friend she’d been to her after losing her husband to colon cancer.

John nodded, trying to be polite, but his mind was focused on getting to his mother. He wished she’d pick up her speed and glanced at the speedometer. She was doing sixty in a seventy-five, and cars were flying past them like they were standing still. He pulled his phone out and dialed his sister. When she answered, he said, “Hey, we’re on our way.”

“Oh, good, you found Helen. Mom’s hanging in there, so take your time.”

John glanced over at Helen, whose dark blue eyes were focused on the road ahead. He made his tone urgent. “Yeah, we’re coming as quick as we can.” But if Helen heard him, she wasn’t letting on. The needle remained pinned on sixty. So much for that idea, he thought.

Peg said, “John, didn’t you hear me? Everything’s okay. She’s not in any danger right now.”

He looked up and saw their exit for Route 2 coming up in one mile. “Yeah, I know. Coming up on the 2 in a minute. See you in fifteen.” He ended the call, slipped his phone back in his pocket, and drummed his fingers on the armrest as the sprawling factory parks and low-rise office buildings slid past his window.

Helen looked over at him as they came to the interchange. “Don’t fret. We’ll get there just fine, I promise.” She paused as they followed the line of cars exiting the highway then said, “So, your mum told me you work in Nepal. How did you ever end up there?”

“I’m an expedition leader,” John said. “I went there because that’s where the real mountains are.”

She turned onto the southbound lane of Route 2 and, picking up speed, went on, “But don’t we have mountains here? Some pretty big ones, I might say.”

John almost smiled. “The ones around here are nothing but hills compared to what’s over there.”

“So, what’s an expedition leader do?” she said.

“Depends on what the expedition is for,” he said, and remembered he was supposed to meet Orson and Kembe in four days. He pulled his phone out and typed a quick note to self to let them know he wouldn’t be there to meet them at the bus.

She was quiet a moment, then said, “I see. And what kinds of expeditions do you lead?”

“Summit attempts,” John said, putting his phone away.

“So, you’re a climber. My goodness! Your mum never told me that. What mountains have you climbed? Everest?” She said the mountain’s name almost as if she was afraid to hear the answer.

John eyed her, dismissing the awestruck expression on her round face. “As a matter of fact, yes.”

She turned to him, and her eyes were large behind her oversized round-rimmed glasses. “Good Lord, young man. If I was your mum, I’d be worried sick.”

“She doesn’t,” John said as she turned onto East Hale Parkway and headed to the hospital around a sweeping tree-lined bend. “And I aim to keep it that way.”

“Well, not to worry. She won’t hear anything from me,” she said pulling into the hospital entrance. She drove up to the front door and stopped. “Her room’s on the fourth floor. 4132. Off you go. I’ll park and be up in a bit.”

He grabbed his pack, got out, and found his way up to the fourth floor. His sister was at the nursing station talking with a nurse. When she saw him, she broke off the conversation and hurried into his arms, clutching him tight to her feather-light body. For a minute he thought the worst had happened, that their mother had suddenly passed, but when she pulled back and studied him with her soft blue eyes, he relaxed and drank in the long Patterson family face. She’d lost weight she didn’t need to lose since the last time he saw her three years ago.

At last, she patted his shoulder. “Come.”

She led him down the hallway under the hum and glare of fluorescent lights, past idle x-ray machines, portable medical documentation stations, and janitorial carts to the wide sliding glass doors of their mother’s ICU room. When he peered through them, he shuddered. His mother’s ageless, everpresent upright posture had melted into a limp wraith-like form on the bed. He glanced at his sister as the full weight of the impending future settled on his shoulders. She pressed her pencil-thin lips together, and the look of pity, acceptance, and sorrow in her eyes struck him like a fist barrelling into his chest. Suddenly, his legs wouldn’t move and his throat tightened.

His sister drew a breath then straightened her shoulders. Though he’d never admit it to anyone, she was the strong one—the one he looked to for answers when life was shitting on him—like it was doing right now, and she had been for the last three years. She turned to him with an unspoken invitation to step into the room ahead of her.

At his mother’s bedside sat Bob Murphy, a longtime friend of the family. The man got up with a forlorn expression on his long face. He’d been there for a while, as far as John could tell. His dark eyes were a little red around the edges, as if he hadn’t slept. Bob put his mottled hand on John’s shoulder, pressing his spindled fingers into him to convey his sympathy, and stepped aside. He cleared his throat. “I’ll…um…go grab a cup of coffee.”

John nodded at the gesture and turned his eyes onto his mother. When he came to her bedside, Peg said, “She’s in a coma and probably won’t come out of it.”

He reached over the bed rail. “She feels cold,” he muttered, laying his hand over his mother’s.

“I know,” Peg whispered.

His gaze narrowed in on the withered woman lying on the bed, traced the lines of her lopsided, wrinkled face under the oxygen mask, saw the drooped cheek and the purple bruise over her brow. This was his mother, a simple woman who could exhaust and embarrass him to no end, but in his heart, he knew she was the one person in this world he could trust without question—who’d stand by him even when he went off half-c****d and still be there waiting for him when he came back home.

I should’ve been here, God damn it!

I should’ve been here, God damn it!He felt Peg’s hand on his shoulder. “I know you don’t want to hear this, John, and I don’t want to talk about it, but it has to be said. The doctors…they, umm…they think it’d be best if we sign a DNR so when it happens, they don’t have to put her through unnecessary pain and discomfort, and I agree. But I told them I needed to hold off until you got here.”

John looked up at her, searching the unwavering, defeated gaze coming back along with the set jaw that betrayed a quivering tremor. He knew she was right, but he couldn’t bring himself to say the words, as if, in doing so, he’d be condemning their mother to die. At last, he looked away, fighting with all his might to keep the river of tears dammed inside him, and said, “Do what you need to do.”

He bolted from the room then and marched down the hall, his eyes downcast, not wanting to meet anyone’s face. He knew it was wrong, that he shouldn’t have shot out of his mother’s room, but he had to get out of there, had to breathe, get a handle on himself. And the irony of walking out on the one person who really mattered—like his father had done to his mother so many years ago—wasn’t lost on him, and he hated himself for it.

John opened the door to his mother’s bungalow as Peg pulled away from the curb to go home and check on her husband, Stu, and the kids. It had been a long day for both of them, too long, and he was totally spent. He bent over and rubbed his leg where the prosthetic connected, remembering Nabin’s little painkillers falling to the floor and rolling away this morning, or was it yesterday? Christ, he didn’t know. All he did know was that he’d give just about anything he had right now for one of those little white pills.

He gritted his teeth.

Suck it up, Buttercup.

Suck it up, Buttercup.Finally, he stepped inside the house he’d grown up in. As always, coming back home was like walking into the past—as if he’d never left it. He surveyed the room as the faint odor of lavender surrounded him along with the ticking of the clock on the mantel. Again, the wave of feeling out of control swept over him. He gazed into the gloom of the early evening shadows casting geometric shapes on the walls. In the far corner, an old marble-topped cherry pedestal table sat with a large Tiffany lamp on top. The stained glass lamp was an heirloom that had been in the family since before he was born. Two oil paintings of a streetscape of some tiny village in New York were placed prominently over the fireplace. They were the work of his great-grandmother, or so his mother had told him once.

He dropped his pack beside him and flipped the light switch, chasing the shadows out of the broad rectangular room. Soft, golden light from a pair of floor lamps bathed the space that was pretty much the way it had been when he’d left home. The only exceptions were a new flat screen TV, wall-to-wall brown carpeting and a two-tone tan upholstered couch.

Wandering in, he ran his fingers over the back of a wingback chair’s woven tweed upholstery and down its polished cherry trim. Peg had told him she’d found their mother on the floor right beside it. This was his mother’s chair, where she worked her crossword puzzles or read from her exhaustive collection of novels by the great authors: Michener, Nabokov, Salinger, Caldwell, Brontë… He forced away the unbidden image of his mother lying helpless on the floor and sat in her chair. The chair she spent so much time in, the chair that was as much a part of her as the books she read.

He fingered the thick paperback puzzle book sitting on the end table beside him. It was open to a page with a half-finished puzzle. He picked it up and a card slid out from underneath it and fell to the floor. Leaning over, he picked it up. It was a birthday card.

His birthday card!

He’d forgotten he was going to be turning forty in a couple weeks. He opened it and read the verse and the scrawled handwriting below it, telling him how much he was loved, how proud she was of him, how important he was to her, and how much she missed him and suddenly the tears came and wouldn’t stop.

Esther Patterson drew her final breath three days later at 6:42 p.m. As her frail body sank with the last exhalation, John looked down from where he stood beside her bed and studied the woman who’d raised him and his sister all by herself. Until a few days ago, he’d never given much thought to the sacrifices she’d made for him and his sister: going without so they could have nice clothes, good food on their plates, a yearly weeklong vacation in the woods—albeit, in a tent—birthday parties, Halloween costumes, prom dresses and tuxedoes, a college education, and a decent Christmas every year. Now, it was all he could think about.

He gripped the bed rail, digging his nails into his palms, and felt his sister’s hand settle over his. “I should’ve come home more often, should’ve written and called regularly, told you I loved you and that you were always on my mind,” he muttered. He turned his head and locked eyes with his sister as the steady whine of the heart monitor filled the stilted silence. Her tender tearful gaze coming back crushed him. They both knew the score. He was a self-absorbed son-of-a-b***h, an angry-at-the world asshole, but she loved him anyway.

The doctor came into the room and shut the heart monitor off. After a quick verification that Esther had passed on, he left them alone. Finally, Peg tugged at John’s sleeve and said, “You okay?”

John shook his head. “Yeah, I think so. So, I guess we have some things to figure out,” he said, staring at his mother.

“Actually, most of it’s already taken care of. I would’ve told you earlier, but I didn’t think you were in a good place to hear it.”

“Oh, really?” John said, surprised. He glanced up at her, taken aback, not liking the fact she’d presumed to know what he wanted or didn’t want to hear. Moverover, he was pissed she’d taken it upon herself to make all the arrangements, effectively excluding him.

Peg looked off toward the window and was quiet a moment. “You know, you really need to stop assuming things, John.”

“Assuming what?” he said, fighting to keep the annoyance out of his tone. On top of that, his leg was killing him and the lack of Sanjay’s herbal medicine wasn’t helping. He felt his body tighten and its urge—or rather need—for the little white pills was overwhelming.

“Oh, come on, we both know what I mean,” Peg said and sighed. She walked over near the window and nibbled a fingernail. “I really don’t want to do this.”

John sucked his lip, wondering what that meant.

Why do women always talk in riddles?

Why do women always talk in riddles?“Do what?”

She turned back, rolled her eyes, and constrained her voice. “Argue!”

“Who said anything about arguing?” he said, letting go of the bed rail and waving his hand.

“It’s in your tone, and could you please lower your voice?”

“Christ, Peg. I just made a simple comment, okay?” he said. “And it’s not like I have a lot to say in the matter, anyway. You’re the one who has been here with her. You know what she wants more than I do.”

“Well, for your information, she’s the one who made all the arrangements.”

He blinked. “Are you serious?”

She nodded. “Once I knew she was…well, you know…I started looking into things and found out she had it all organized.”

“When…”

“Five years ago,” she said, drifting back toward the bed. “Apparently, she went to a lawyer, drew up her will, bought a plot and a stone and prepaid for her funeral. There’s also a letter addressed to each of us from her. The lawyer gave them to me.”

John’s mind was a whirlwind of questions. “Have you read…”

“No, not yet,” she said. “I was thinking we’d read them together sometime before you have to go back.” She paused. “By the way, when would that be?”

He sized up her enigmatic expression, trying to discern whether she was being sincere or sarcastic. “I get back when I get there.” But in the back of his mind, he could just hear his boss, Ken, telling him he’d had to find someone to take his place, meaning he would essentially be out of Nepal for good.

Peg nodded, then walked around the bed and put her hands on his shoulders. “I love you, so let’s not fight, okay? Mom wouldn’t want that. Not now.”

“Yeah, you’re right.” He forced a smile. “Just let me know what I can do.”

John buried his mother four days later in a small countrified cemetery outside of town. It had all gone as his mother had planned: closed casket, no calling hours, a short service at the Episcopalian Church and a brief moment at the gravesite. That, in a nutshell, was his mother. She didn’t like being fussed over, and so she’d made things as quick and as painless as possible for her children.

John stood in the living room, looking over the room that suddenly felt empty and abandoned. On the old marble-topped pedestal table was a metal-framed black and white picture of his mom, sister, and him. It had been taken when he was a toddler. He went over and picked it up, studying the vibrant young woman with dark wavy hair who was sitting at a picnic table holding him on her lap. It had been taken in the woods. The adoring look in his mother’s large brown eyes stared back at him. For a moment it was as if she were right there in the room with him. He chewed his lip as he gazed into the unremembered past. His mom had been the one constant in his life, the one person he could always count on to have his back. At length, he set the picture back on the table and as he did so the faded black and white photo slid a bit under the glass. There was something behind it. He took the picture back up, knitted his brow and studied the edge of the frame where a tell-tale edge peeked out.

Another photo?

Another photo?He turned the frame over and removed the back panel, revealing a small wallet-sized snapshot. Turning it over, he looked down at a picture of his mother sitting beside Bob. But it was the baby in Bob’s arm that made him blink. He flipped the photo back over and saw a date written on the back with his name scrawled below it.

What the hell?

What the hell?Why would Bob be holding him? It didn’t make sense. Then again, Bob had always been a good friend of the family, so perhaps it was nothing. Still, it left him at odds. He tucked the photo in his shirt pocket, buttoned the frame up and set it back on the table. He’d ask his sister about it later. Right now, he had something else on his mind. He went to the kitchen, snatched the letter-sized envelope off the counter along with a beer from the fridge, and opened the back door to the house—his home now, his sister had informed him.

Popping the tab on the can of Coors, he took a sip and surveyed the flowering lavender hyacinths, daffodils and yellow tulips in the back yard. In the far corner of the pie-shaped lot, a thick gray willow was coming to full foliage. A g**g of squirrels was skittering in its hefty crown. One of them was busy robbing the resident bird feeder.

So many memories here. The swinging hammock under the willow he’d lain in as a child watching for shooting stars was gone now, but when he closed his eyes, he could still see it. And then there were hunting nightcrawlers in the flower beds and chasing fireflies. The drone of crickets and sitting around the makeshift firepit as it crackled, spit and hissed into the warm summer night. Later there was the fort he and Billy McMasters built on the edge of the woods hemming in the property. Many a night, they had retreated to it, listening to Skynyrd, Zeppelin, and Clapton on the radio.

At length, he pulled out one of the wrought iron wire chairs from the patio table and sat with his beer in hand. The beer wasn’t doing much to ease his body’s nagging need for Sanjay’s remedy, but it was better than nothing. He sucked down a gulp and thought about the drive he’d taken earlier that morning through the neighborhood visiting his old haunts: the high school where he’d played tight end for the Rams, the creek where he and Billy had fished for trout. Later, he ended up out at the pavilion at Stagecoach Park where he’d said his last good-bye to Vanessa Hall, his high school sweetheart. She was heading to college back east. They made plans to keep in touch, but it never happened.

He took another gulp of beer, stretched his legs in front of him and crossed his arms over his chest. Those days were long gone, and his life was on the other side of the world. What was he going to do with a house? His sister already had one, and he was loath to sell it. That left what…renting it out? A landlord, he was not! He sighed. Well, he’d get things figured out soon enough. Right now, he needed to get the damned prosthetic off his leg. He leaned over and unstrapped it and as he did so, the letter slipped out of his pocket. He picked it up and a moment later had it open in front of him.

John

JohnBecause we really never know when the good Lord is going to take us home with him, I wanted to take the time to tell you how much I love you and the joy you’ve given me throughout my long life. You have been my strength when I lost hope over the years. There’s not a day that goes by that you are not on my mind. I think about what you’re doing, whether you’re having a good day or not, and where you are and if you’re safe. And yes, John, I can see you shaking your head. But I’m your mother and it’s my job because, you see, from the moment you were conceived, I have loved you. You are the very best part of me, my magnum opus.

Because we really never know when the good Lord is going to take us home with him, I wanted to take the time to tell you how much I love you and the joy you’ve given me throughout my long life. You have been my strength when I lost hope over the years. There’s not a day that goes by that you are not on my mind. I think about what you’re doing, whether you’re having a good day or not, and where you are and if you’re safe. And yes, John, I can see you shaking your head. But I’m your mother and it’s my job because, you see, from the moment you were conceived, I have loved you. You are the very best part of me, my magnum opus.And to you, my wanderlust boy, who tested me every minute of every day, telling me what you thought I needed to know, you cannot know how my heart swells with pride when I tell people you’re a guide for the tallest mountain in the world. Yet I worry about you. When I don’t hear from you, especially two years ago when you seemed to drop off the face of the earth, I was so afraid something had happened to you. You know, you could’ve told me you’d lost part of your leg. Oh yes, I found out all about it, and I know you’ve climbed that mountain, too!

And to you, my wanderlust boy, who tested me every minute of every day, telling me what you thought I needed to know, you cannot know how my heart swells with pride when I tell people you’re a guide for the tallest mountain in the world. Yet I worry about you. When I don’t hear from you, especially two years ago when you seemed to drop off the face of the earth, I was so afraid something had happened to you. You know, you could’ve told me you’d lost part of your leg. Oh yes, I found out all about it, and I know you’ve climbed that mountain, too!More than anything, though, I’ve missed you over the last few years. I know it’s unfair to say so, but I can’t help it. You were my little troublemaker, always getting into some kind of mischief. Even now, as I write this here in bed, I half expect my door to come bursting open with this little blond-haired boy flying in, all excited about some new toy or gadget you saw on TV. You grew up all too fast for me. Remember, you are not an island. Life is too short, too precious to go through all alone. Find someone to share your life with and make beautiful babies. Yes, I went there. I’m your mother, deal with it! And finally, treat the people who matter in your life as I have treated you—with kindness, compassion and love. It’s the best and only advice I can give.

More than anything, though, I’ve missed you over the last few years. I know it’s unfair to say so, but I can’t help it. You were my little troublemaker, always getting into some kind of mischief. Even now, as I write this here in bed, I half expect my door to come bursting open with this little blond-haired boy flying in, all excited about some new toy or gadget you saw on TV. You grew up all too fast for me. Remember, you are not an island. Life is too short, too precious to go through all alone. Find someone to share your life with and make beautiful babies. Yes, I went there. I’m your mother, deal with it! And finally, treat the people who matter in your life as I have treated you—with kindness, compassion and love. It’s the best and only advice I can give.All my love,

All my love,Mom

Mom