Habit (9 page)

What strikes me right away is how much more there is to this place than I saw at first. There's the cozy area where they get you to sign up, and then there are the treatment areas: the dreaded infusion room with its rows of dentist chairs and individual TVs to watch while you get your chemo. There's the radiation area in the basement with its thick concrete walls. Now, we seem to have hopscotched over everything to the place with the beds, where the struggle is so much more immediate and real. In an ordinary hospital, our paranoia could be eased by happy sights: mothers being wheeled outside with newborns; flowers and bobbing balloons; orthopedic patients with casts on their legs. But this hospital is exclusively for cancer and now Ma has moved, hopefully temporarily, to the place you go when you might be dying. The hallways and rooms are very quiet and sacred, like a tomb, and they seem to go on for miles and miles and miles.

There's a very sick old woman in the next bed who is not up to socializing with her own revolving flow of visitors: saucer-eyed grandchildren and anxious adult offspring, optimistically approving procedures on her behalf. When they all step outside, the woman moans and protests to the aides that she has had enough. This has made Ma think serious thoughts, and she's asked Father Basil to come down from Carlisle. She wants me to meet him, so I work another quick trip to Huntingdon into my tight round of interviews at assisted-living places in anticipation of her release and the beginning of radiation.

I had been instructing myself all day to be on good behavior, and not to overreact if Father Basil turns out to be all pompous and patronizing. Not just because I'm not Orthodox and who knows what Ma's been telling him about my heathen ways, but because I am a woman and I don't like what I hear about the role of women in this church.

My first contact with Orthodoxy was in L.A. I was filming
Deadly Intentions,
a TV miniseries based on the true story of a Sweet Young Greek Orthodox Girl (Madolyn Smith, the Other Woman in
Urban Cowboy
) who marries a Charming Young Doctor (Michael Biehn, from the first
Terminator
) with a Mysteriously Creepy Mother (Cloris Leachman—my favorite in
Young Frankenstein
). Things go downhill quickly when the Doctor turns out to be a Raving Lunatic trying to poison Madolyn and stuff, and she has to escape with the Baby in the nick of time.

I was playing the Spunky But Loyal Best Friend Who Suspects Before Anyone Else That Something Is Amiss. We filmed the wedding scene in a gorgeous Greek Orthodox church somewhere in the San Fernando Valley. When I got into my pink chiffon bridesmaid's gown a little too early for hair and makeup (Cloris's character wore white to her son's wedding, which should have been a tip-off), I slipped in to check out the church. The priest who would be performing the filmed ceremony offered a tour. This was long before Ma became Orthodox and I didn't know much of anything, but I was really impressed by the gold leaf all over the place, the wide Byzantine arches and the beautiful, vivid colors on the walls, with fantastically detailed old icons everywhere. What sort of turned me off, though, was when I asked if I could see behind the altar.

The priest said no. No women were allowed back there. I know from Ma that the women and men are separated during church services; they stand on opposite sides. Since I am most emphatically in accord with the team in the Episcopal Church that approves not just women but openly gay and lesbian priests and bishops, I've got a pretty healthy grudge going about Orthodoxy's apparent attitude toward women. I am not expecting to be disarmed by this Father Basil person. But as it turns out, that is exactly what happens from the moment he strides up to me in his sensible shoes, long black robe flapping, bushy grey beard halfway down his chest, and opens his arms to sweep me into a hearty bear hug, bumping me up against his rather substantial Santa Claus middle.

Father Basil gives off a jolly, unmistakably
past-life-as-a-motorcycle-dude
sort of vibe, which I take to immediately. I can tell right away that nobody's going to try to convert me or judge my lack of whatever. When Ma is taken out for a test, we go to the hospital library for a very enlightening session of Straight Talk that clears up a few mysteries for each of us.

Father Basil tells me he used to be a rock and roll musician. He comes from a complicated family and joined the Orthodox Church as an adult. His equally devout wife, who met him in high school and converted at the same time as he, is a nurse. (
Orthodox priests can be married? Hm!
) Because her father has rectal cancer, Father Basil's wife had already been helpful on the phone when we were learning about the disease. They have no intention of steering or influencing any of our decisions along the way. Father Basil makes it very clear that he really sees that Ma would be quite a handful. Not just now because of the cancer, but in general as well, especially for her children.

What's also fascinating is that my rather proper mother, who barely tolerated Colette's hippy teenage phase and has an extensive collection of well-thumbed
Social Registers
, genuinely
loves
this guy. What's more, he is truly fond of her. Father Basil and his wife put out an offer sometime recently to take Ma into their home and nurse her through the radiation. He says this offer still stands, but there is no pressure, only support of whatever she and her family decide to do. As we talk, it becomes more and more clear that Father Basil has something on his mind he's not quite saying. So I ask him what it is.

Turns out he got the wrong impression, probably because of the funeral plans. A few years ago when she converted, Ma announced to the family that she would not be able to be buried as planned at the Church of the Redeemer. This is a lovely old Episcopal church on the Main Line where a lot of Ma's maternal ancestors were installed, going back to the 1800s. There is a family plot kept in perpetuity. While my parents were both Roman Catholic at the time of my father's death, we knew he didn't care much what Ma did with him as long as she was happy. So after the military honors Daddy wanted in Florida, she had him cremated.

—Margaret thinks Roman Catholics can't be cremated, Ma.

—I know, but there isn't enough room for any more full-length graves. Just two little spots are left, near Mummy.

—How about a nice urn?

—He'll be fine with the box from the funeral home. You know Daddy; he was a rebellious dresser and wouldn't want a big fuss.

—At the Redeemer, with all those huge monuments, surrounded by the crème de la crème of Philadelphia's old guard? You're going to just stick him into the ground with his mother-in-law in a
cardboard BOX??

After some reflection, it made a tiny bit of sense. Granny and Daddy did get along well (they shared a fondness for cigarettes, crossword puzzles, and whiskey), and Ma would eventually join them.

Or so we thought, until our mother became Orthodox and a whole new, more elaborate set of rules kicked in. Orthodox Christians are even more allergic to cremation than traditional Roman Catholics and Ma seemed to have no intention of taking chances with her own remains. They also can't be embalmed, and they have to be buried in an Orthodox plot.

Ma's even got her own personal Orthodox shroud. It's a special white baptismal robe she was given to wear when they dunked her in the River Jordan. She brought it to a family picnic at the Penllyn Club after she got back from the Holy Land because she wanted all the grandchildren and great-grandchildren to see what she'd be buried in. She made them pose for a picture: All of them lined up next to her on the grass in their dripping swimsuits and water wings, holding her death shroud spread out between them like they've been shaking sand off a big white beach blanket. Ma is beaming. Everyone else looks sort of spooked.

So our family had to adjust to the idea that Daddy would spend eternity with his mother-in-law and a bunch of highbrow strangers. I'm thinking Felix should take Ma's empty slot if he doesn't get around to marrying anyone else so there will be at least one blood relative to keep Daddy company. We decided that while Ma's funeral was going to be tricky, it was manageable, but that was before she and Photini switched from the local Orthodox church to Saint Mark of Ephesus, two hours upstate in Carlisle. That's when I suggested it might be helpful if she gave me some clear instructions.

—What sort of instructions?

—Well, if you can't be embalmed and you can't be cremated, and the church is out in the middle of nowhere—

—So sorry to be such a burden to you.

—No, it's okay.

—I want all my descendants to go to my funeral together. That's the most important thing.

—Right, Ma, that shouldn't be a problem. As long as they're not having an ice storm in Vermont. And Colette will just have to somehow zap herself here from England before you start to sm—

—If that happens, just go ahead with it anyway. You can have a big party after everyone gets here. I'm sure you'll all have a wonderful time.

—That's nice; your own children won't be at your funeral because it's more important you obey a bunch of wacked-out religious—

—Susie.

—I'm sorry. I know this is important to you. I really do want to get it right for you.

—It's very important, Susie, and you should be thinking about it, too.

—Yeah, well, David and I are going to be scattered on Mount Desert Island.

—Oh
(dripping with an unvoiced opinion) . . .

—I don't want to hear it, Ma.

—Well, I'm sure you'll be very happy there, and your children will never know how to find you.

—What do Orthodox people do if they die on vacation overseas? God forbid, I screw it up so badly that you end up in the wrong heaven. . . .

Ma did all the research and came up with a detailed contract from a funeral home near her new church that knew how to make Orthodox preparations. I paid for the burial plot and filed the particulars. But I balked at emergency evacuation insurance for the remains of vacationing Orthodox types when Ma admitted the priest said rules could be bent a little for extenuating circumstances. I also refused to put down a nonrefundable deposit with the funeral home, on the basis that she had a solid track record of switching religions. Who was to know whether Ma wouldn't have something else in mind when the moment was upon us?

My lack of faith in her faith made Ma quite indignant despite my assurance that I would definitely adapt to her wishes according to whatever the religion du jour was when she took her last breath. I was presented with several long handwritten pages of rambling explanation about why this church was indeed the Final Definitive Answer To Everything, which I think I filed somewhere, too. But I didn't budge on the down payment, and apparently she shared her version of our standoff with Father Basil. He drew his own conclusions about my fears based on his past experience with concerned family members, and sees this as his chance to finally reassure me.

—Oh, that, I say. No, we definitely don't think you're running a cult. My mother's an idiot, but she's not completely stupid.

—It's good you feel that way, he says dubiously.

—No, it's just that she switches around so much. No offense. If she wants to be buried in Carlisle, that's fine; none of us will have a problem. But she's like a dog with a bone with each religion, and we've been through too many different bones. It makes her really mad when we don't just sign right up.

—Oh, he says. I'm always advising my wife to go easy on our kids about that, too.

My mother may be a little nuts, I think to myself, as Father Basil and I bound back down the hall like two old buddies to see how the test went. But at least she's not a Moonie. And she does know how to pick her priests. Father Basil has class.

T
HERE'S THIS THING
I hate hate hate having to even think about, and now it's time to do it.

Colette and I have talked it to death over the years:

—I won't be able to do it, Coco. Kissing her good-bye and walking out of the room and down the hall. That's the killer: the part where I walk down the hall and home to my family.

—Well, maybe one of us will be there with you.

—Oh gosh. That would be SO helpful.

But nobody's here.

The whole idea of this assisted-living place I've found is that Ma can stay here for a month or so while she's having her radiation treatment. She won't have to fix her own meals, and if she needs a shower or something, they will help her. Then when she's back on her feet, she can go home. That's the idea.

That's not so bad, right?

So, the new place. Grammy and Grampy's Happy Hide-Away (or whatever the hell it's called). It's a good one, we hear. The other inmates seem comfortable. They're all trundling cheerfully around with their oxygen caddies, and the dining room has linen napkins and a pretty view of the woods. There are friendly notices on the bulletin board about Saint Paddy's parties and visiting day from the elementary school; pictures of happy, smiling old ladies making cute little crafts.

There are even people here that we know: Mrs. Martinelli—her husband was Daddy's doctor once and I used to play with her daughter. When I came for the tour, there was Mrs. Martinelli. She looked so fit, I figured she must be visiting somebody, but then it seemed to take her a minute or two to figure out who I was.

The occupational therapist at the hospital gave Ma her first walker. It works really well. It's red, with four wheels and a padded seat, so if you get tired you can stop and sit. The seat opens up with a hinge to a basket underneath into which you can fit a lot of other things like a purse or a bunch of bibles.

I began to believe that Happy Hide-Away was necessary when I stopped at the post office box on the way home from the hospital yesterday, the day before Ma's release. There among the heaps of mail I hadn't gotten around to collecting, was a notice from the school about Sam. He's all messed up and behind in his schoolwork, and I didn't even know.