Thanksgiving Memoriam

By the time that you read this, Thanksgiving 2012 will mostly be in the past, and shoppers nationwide will get ready for the unofficial kickoff to the holiday season. Ho-hum. Not worried at all about what am I going to get somebody this holiday season. Hell, my ass is already too broke to give a shit about that right now. At least I can say my Thanksgiving was a good one. I got to hang out with a friend, eat ham, mac'n cheese, turnip greens and drink until I had to pee. I was also considering waiting until this weekend to post a blog about the anniversary of my mother's passing 33 years ago this coming Saturday, November, 24. Well, I guess there's no better time than the present to talk about this. 

At around 8 or 9:00am on this date back in 1979, several days after the Thanksgiving holiday, the phone rings at my dad's house back in Milwaukee. It woke me up out of a pleasant dream, whatever it was. I got up and answered the phone and found out it was St. Joseph's Hospital, where my mom was fighting a losing battle against cancer in her kidneys. Since I was still groggy from just waking up, I gave the phone to my dad, who got the news he dreaded to hear. About an hour or so later, we went to the hospital with a few relatives to see what was the status of my mom. There I saw her deceased body, eyes closed, motionless and her mouth open forming an O. I had just turned 9 years of age just under a month earlier, so dealing with a death in the family at such a young age was something entirely new to me. 

Arrangements were made for her funeral & burial about a week later (November 29-ish) by the O'Bee Funeral Home on Center Street to be held at the Mt. Zion Missionary Baptist Church off MLK Drive and  the Evergreen Cemetary on Green Bay Road, respectively. My dad bought me my first (and only) three-piece suit from a place in suburban West Allis, near the Allis-Chalmers plant where my dad worked. The following week leading up to the funeral was pretty normal. To this date, I'm not even sure if I told anyone about my mom's death. Probably did. I spent the last few days of November with the family (both sides) remembering my mom and having more than enough food to last a few weeks. 

I can tell you something that I haven't mentioned about being at my mother's funeral: If you though that I would shed a few tears about all this, you'd be wrong....then. What I did was hold back any possible tears and hold them until another day. My sister Charlotte, who has never been satisfied with whatever I do, weeped with a vengeance. I showed no remorse; let's get this thing over with, I thought. Maybe it's no wonder  why my eyes look a bit wrinkled. Too many tears got held up in my tear ducts over the years has caused some major drops from my eyes.  Yes, showing some sincere emotions has been hard for me. The only time I came close to losing it was at my grandmother's funeral outside Carthage, Mississippi in 1995. Try holding back tears AND fighting back sniffles at the same time and let me know who lost. Keep in mind when my dad passed in 2007, I didn't care. He was old news in my book who embarrassed me enough in the past. 

Now as the anniversary of her passing comes approaching, I do believe she has forgiven me for the last comments I ever made to her. Why do you think I've been cross-dressing for over 14 years? Her spirit has been living inside of me since Day 1! Thanks, MOM!!!