in the mail

Returning home after a week away, I take the bag of mail with me to Ithaca Bakery.  It is quiet for a Sunday morning, the tables about a third empty.


Toss, toss, toss...Land's End for Men (though I do take a quick peek, just to see what Rich might order); Sierra Club petition (no political energy now); donation request to Memorial Sloan Kettering (sorry, a million or so already has been paid).  


Keep the tax consultant bill (well worth it -- IRS says all is forgiven); and the electric bill (now in my name) and the lawn mowing bill (also well worth it, nice guys -- though I wonder why I don't tear up all that green stuff and plant something I can eat).


Another sip of the my latte, a few licks at the foam, then onto the next item:  The annual Hospicare newsletter. 


I would be lying if I said it's a surprise.  After all, I gave permission.  I knew it was coming.


There he is:  On the cover, and on page three, Rich and Marlaine, the message therapist during his four months.  Half-upright in his Gerry Chair, they are in the garden, Rich with his ever-present kit filled with snacks, his shaver, the call button -- and his smile.


I turn the page and chew the bagel.  258 deaths in 2009...131 from cancer...daily census, 54.3 (.3?  Not a whole person?)  The place is empty enough, maybe I can cry, but no, I won't, even if few will see and other lives matter to them.  Love, after all, is specific.


Statistics distract only for a minute or two.  I look at his face, look again and again, and when I return home I will once more inhale the aftershave in the bathroom I now rarely use, and press his ties against my face, and realize the lawn will remain because I can't put down roots in a place that can never be home.