Tuesday, December 4, 2012

Father, Son, and Holy Toast


My mother was searching for a word, but it refused to be found. At last night's dinner table she told M and me how she often fainted at Mass as a girl. The word she couldn't quite muster was "Communion," or perhaps "host." Her eyes flutter at these moments, as if the blinking might cause the word to materialize, writ in front of her. But, no. This word, like others, had somehow sifted itself into the dustbin of her 88-year-old brain. "You know," she said, "when they put the toast in your mouth." We knew exactly what she meant--and she went on to tell us that she fainted every Sunday at Communion time. Too many people milling around, she theorized. Too much heat.

It seems, sometimes, that my mother has reached a point where her first and only language is becoming, by small increments, foreign to her. After her pre-dinner martini, she often speaks English the way I speak French. Creatively. Through a roundabout back door, where you are forced to explain the more sophisticated concepts or ideas with words that you know compensating for the words you don't know.

I also wonder if these teen-age fainting spells prefigured her mid-life diagnosis of narcolepsy and sleep apnea. These days if the conversation lulls at dinner, her eyes close, and she sometimes lists to one side.  "Mom," I say, "You're falling asleep." Or, "Mom, don't fall off your chair." Her eyes might flutter open then, or she might speak to me with them still closed.

"I'm awake," she'll say. "Awake, but far away." She never says where she's been exactly. But maybe she's in church, fainting--there in the company of her long-dead mother. There with her sisters, smelling the incense, feeling the heat, and falling to the ground.

5 comments:

Elizabeth said...

Oh good lord. I often fainted and felt faint during mass when I was a girl, too. Does this not bode well for my thought that I'd grow steadily into being a strong, Italian peasant?

Also, before I forget -- do you ever read Andrea Carlisle's blog about taking care of her 98 year old mother Alice? I think you'd love it.

Ms. Moon said...

The Holy Toast.

Suz said...

maybe she isn't processing alcohol very well
or it reacts to her meds.....

michelle said...

Toast Host. Same same. I say let the lady have her martini and speak her Beefeater English and enjoy the rest of her life.

I hope my kids do that for me.

xoxoxo

Milky Tea said...

"I am awake. Awake, but far away." I find that the most poignant words I have read in a long time. May God bless your mother and keep her constant and happy always. And may God bless you always for your devotion to her.

Take care...

TK.