Make It Count

I feel as if I’m on the precipice of a major breakdown. Wave after wave of anxiety, stress, depression, helplessness, anger, frustration knocks me down over and over. The pressure society and social media have put on me to be the perfect wife, mother, co-worker and friend has taken its toll on me.

Add a pandemic to the mix and you’ve got a recipe for disaster.

I was different before this happened, said everyone ever.

Covid-19.

Coronavirus.

So here I am. A random, inconsequential person that is just out here living her “best life” despite the constraints of remote work, remote learning, mask wearing, sanitizing and keeping it all together so she can scrape by every month to pay her bills.

And all the while trying to keep her sanity.

Raise your hand if you’re in the same boat paddling up a creek filled with poop emojis.

I need to get out of the house. The constant monotonous tone of stay at home, save lives ringing in my ears can’t stop me from getting in my car to go to the store for “milk”.

*Cough* Wine.

I get in my car and start the engine, rubbing my hands together against the cold weather while I wait for the heater to kick in. Red wine always warms me right up, I decide. I am struggling to pay the electric bill, but I can always afford red wine. I live in the land of opportunity and credit card debt.

I take the long way to the store and ponder my forthcoming existential crisis and what it might mean for my family and my bank account. If I truly have a breakdown and can’t work, I can’t make money.

I pull up into a parking space right in front of the liquor store and throw on my mask. When I get out of my car, I step on something on the ground. I crouch down to pick it up, which is not normally something I do. Even pre-pandemic I was never interested in touching something a random stranger had dropped to lie on the dirty asphalt.

It’s a little black notebook and the brand name says Moleskine. I opened it and between a lot of scribbles and sketches are questions written in cursive. Questions about addresses of possible whereabouts of whom I think may be the notebook owner’s birth father. There is a date of birth and adoption, lots of circles around the map of ideas that must have given the owner a lead. I keep flipping and it’s more of the same, phone numbers, addresses and names with question marks at the end.

I am fully immersed in this mystery to the point that I don’t realize I’m standing in the middle of the parking lot, when a car honks at me. I wave apologetically and get back in my car to keep wading through the conundrum that is this little black notebook. I look up and around me, trying to see if anyone is scanning the lot, desperate to find their book of clues. Nobody seems like they are searching for anything.

I finally gather from the notebook that the owner’s name is Elizabeth and she believes her father to be a Frank with numerous options for a last name. Then I make it to the middle of the book and an address is written in bold letters and underlined. I’m dying to drive there right now. I feel like it’s a real life soap opera and I have to keep watching to find out what happens.

I get out of the car, notebook in hand, and head to my original destination. I pick out the same bottle of wine I always do and head to the counter.

“Anyone come in here, looking for this? I found it in the parking lot,” I say and hold up the notebook to show the clerk. He shakes his head.

“No, but if you leave your number I could call you if they do,” he replies with a wink and I tamp down a shiver of revulsion.

“That’s ok,” I say politely. I pay him and grab my bottle of wine, then quickly head back to my car. I put the notebook and the bottle of wine on the seat next to me and hang out for a little while longer, peering around for some sign of Elizabeth’s return. I’m sure she will come looking for it.

Man, I’m really losing it. I’m acting like I know this woman. Maybe she did go to the address. Maybe the father turned out to be a loser or not even the right guy and she gave up the search, grabbed some vodka and went on her merry way. But something in my gut was telling me to drive to the address in the little black book. I might be invading someone’s privacy, but I have to know if she found her father. I haven’t been this motivated to follow through on something in almost a year and the adrenaline was intoxicating.

I type the address into my GPS and find myself following its pleasantly dull voice in a direction 40 miles away. All the way there I am imagining all sorts of scenarios. That I get a newspaper article written about me for reuniting a long lost daughter with her father.

That I get to a ramshackle old farmhouse and a serial killer is there waiting for me and this was all a trap.

The possibilities are endless.

The voice finally tells me I’m one minute away and I pull down a long driveway that’s dimly lit and surrounded by trees. I start to grow worried that my last imagined scenario is about to come true. Then I see the beautifully paved stone driveway and a gorgeous three story house and I breathe a sigh of relief. People don’t get murdered in houses like this.

I’m incredibly nervous as I walk up to the door and knock, clutching the notebook like it’s a lifeline anchoring me to this unfinished story. A middle aged woman with blonde hair and blue eyes opens the door with a confused look on her face.

“Can I help you?” she asks in a prim voice.

“Elizabeth?” I ask. I just know it’s her. I don’t know how I know, but I know.

“Do I know you?” she inquires with a distinct air of superiority. I’m sure she knows she doesn’t know me, with my worn leggings and bright pink winter hat with a poof on it. I’m definitely below her pay grade.

“My name is Kathleen. I’m sorry to intrude, but I found this notebook in a parking lot and...well I read it. I probably shouldn’t have, but I did. And I felt like I should go to the address in it and...um, I’m sorry. I just needed to know if you found your father,” I explain. I sound lame to my own ears and she probably thinks I’m a creeper. But the moment I hold up the little black book, her face lights up and her whole demeanor changes. Then tears spring to her eyes.

"Thank you so much for bringing it. I did find him. Would you like to come in?” she asks. I’m a little taken aback at her sudden shift from ice cold judgment to warm sincerity, but I follow her into the house.

Then I see a man in a hospital bed in the middle of the living room, with a nurse changing his IV bag. He looks like he’s dying and I stupidly blurt that out without thinking.

“He is dying. Cancer. I found him just in time. He’s sleeping right now, but he is still sharp as a tack,” she says, smiling through her tears.

All at once I feel even more depressed than I did before I started this journey. She found him but it was too late. All that searching and he’s on his deathbed. I feel like throwing the notebook against the wall and screaming my outrage to the heavens. Elizabeth must sense my mood change because she puts a hand on my shoulder and looks into my eyes.

“It’s ok. I know it seems so unfair, and that’s exactly what I thought at first. But then I realized that if I never searched, if I never tried, I wouldn’t have been able to know him at all. These past couple of days and the few days ahead are all I will have with my father, but they are enough,” she tells me, still smiling.

“Just to get a chance to meet him and talk to him...” she says and then adds, “Believe me, just to know him is more than I could have ever hoped for.”

I’m struck dumb by the realization that this woman is grateful for even a few precious days with her dying father. That she is happy and smiling, even though life has dealt her cruel hand. My worries and anxieties fade into the background of my mind. Suddenly, the things I thought were so important and so hard didn’t seem that serious anymore.

If this woman can smile in the face of such inequity, what is really stopping me from overcoming my own problems? Her strength and resilience flow out of her and it’s as if I can feel it wash over me like a strong river current. I smile shyly at her and hand her the notebook. It’s almost like a loss when she takes it, because I’ve come to the end of the story. She holds it in her hands and strokes the cover fondly.

“I should go. I’ve taken up too much of your time already. But I’m glad to have met you both. Thank you for inviting me in,” I tell her. I give her the first genuine smile I’ve given in a long time.

“No, Kathleen. Thank you for bringing this back to me. I was so upset that I had lost it. It’s the most precious thing in the world to me. It brought me here, right where I am supposed to be,” she replies and to my surprise, hugs me.

I start to walk out the door but she stops me.

“Wait, this may seem strange, but could I have your address? I don’t know if you would want to know when my father passes, but it would be nice to see a familiar face amongst all of the friends and family I’ve never met,” she says and I’m once again surprised and delighted.

“Of course. Please let me know. I would like to be there,” I say. We say our goodbyes after I give her my address and she waves at me from the front porch as I pull away.

On the drive home I resolve to do better, to wake up tomorrow with a fresh perspective and perhaps even a hint of inspiration. I walk in the door to a surly husband who was panicked that I was dead by the side of the road. I go to him and hug him tightly and tell him I love him.

“Where’s the milk?” he asks. I chuckle and tell him it’s a long story.

A week later, I receive a funeral notice in the mail from Elizabeth along with a check for $20,000. I nearly faint when I see it and I know I can’t accept it. A few days later I head to the funeral home and try to give her the check.

“No, Kathleen. My father left me more money than I can spend in two lifetimes. I want you to have this, for bringing me my notebook. It’s worth more to me than any amount of money,” she tells me. I feel tears gathering in my eyes.

“This money will change my life,” I admit and add, “You’ve changed my life.”

“Then make it count,” she replies.