All That Really Matters

I’d have to honestly admit that there really was a sense of peace in the air…that is once I finally got Mom out of the car and carried up the twelve front stairs of the church. This exalted space had no regard for state law and absolutely no consideration for the handicapped. At her behest, I’d struggled to drag my mother out of her dying bed at the Hopewell Hospice Home and get her dressed for a Miracle Healing Revival service with the world-renowned Prophet Eugene Sistrunk. Although my mother had served for more than twenty years as a faithful tither and member at the Holy Waters Church of the Divine Deliverance, Inc….it had been a whopping three years since she’d been dying of cancer and not one member of that church had come by to visit…. not one. Yet, she faithfully sent her tithe money which was a ten percent portion of her allowance that I sent to the hospice from Ann Arbor, Michigan every month.

I could no longer stay in Atlanta, I had to get away and make a life for myself. So, as a top pediatric surgeon at Mott’s Children’s Hospital, I could more than afford the best of hospice care, as well as an allowance to make sure that the attendees got mother whatever her heart desired in her last days. Unfortunately, Mother never wanted anything more than to “sow her seed” into the ministry at the Holy Waters Church; where its members didn’t care enough to come by and pray for her…. hold her hand…. or even kiss her cheek.

Having received that final call from her physician, just a few days prior, I’d taken a leave of absence to come and spend her last “any day now” with her. The cancer had spread throughout her organs and it was just a matter of time before her end. I’d come to hold her hand and brace myself to transition the last member of what I knew to be a family. Yet to my surprise, I found her alive and alert and using the Apple Notebook that I’d sent her to log onto the church’s website. Her graying skin seemed to plump into color when she saw my face….not because it was me, but because I was a ride to church. I was someone who had the authority to check her out of bed and wheel her down the church aisle to “get her miracle healing”.

Since these were her last days, I didn’t bother to reason with her or argue, I just wanted to grant her every wish. It didn’t matter that I no longer believed in the Christian faith as she. Yes, I was agnostic. After losing my brother to leukemia when he was only nine, as a teen, I’d struggled with believing in this God who couldn’t work that one miracle that I prayed for. As soon as I graduated high school, I got as far away from my mom as I could. She was obsessed with religion and I just couldn’t take it. The biggest lesson that I’d learned from my high school counselor was that my mathematical and scientific brain was my ticket to freedom in life. I’ll never forget her words, “Tracy Mineault? If you hate your mother and the life that she has so much, then start making the grade. Earn scholarships, and become a wealthy surgeon.” I’ve learned that sometimes there are things that people can say to you that will stick with you and even change your life; that school counselor’s words did just that. Tenth through twelfth grade was straight A’s for me. I made Valedictorian and Mom couldn’t attend my graduation because the prophet was in town and she had to spend seven nights in the church fasting and praying in what was known as a “shut in”. But, I was a smart girl and this was common behavior for her throughout my high school years. She attended my activities and awards ceremonies, only if it wasn’t on a church night. But, I made it. I rose above her religious psychosis and I made it. My instructors and school principal wrapped their arms around me and bought me clothes and shoes for graduation and I made it….without my religious mother.

I figured mom had checked out a long time ago after all those beatings from my dad. He died while driving drunk, just a couple of months after my brother passed, and that was a blessing in disguise. Riding in the car on the way to church, I looked over at her in the passenger seat as she dosed in and out of consciousness. She never lost her smile, though. It amazed me that this woman could still smile. The loss of my brother, the tyrannical beating and abuse from my alcoholic father, having grown up in foster care and being sexually abused all her life….what did this woman have to smile about? But, as cancer ate away at everything within her physical body, it still had no access to her spiritual plane. The smile on her face reminded me of that old gospel song that spoke, “This JOY that I have…the world didn’t give it to me and the world can’t take it away.” Mom was at peace, and at the end of the day, that’s all that really mattered.

Due to no handicapped parking, I pulled up to the front and got out and carried her wheelchair up the stairway. Holy Waters Church prided itself on being free from sickness and disease and their belief was that anyone who was ill, was probably in SIN….thus, no ramps or parking for the handicapped. Explicitly a banner hung over the entrance that read, “Sickness does not live here”. In my opinion, this was dumb and arrogant, but it was where my mother wanted to be…so I brought her to her sacred space.

Surprisingly, the usher at the door held the door open as if my mom was gonna supernaturally astral project herself from the car into the empty wheelchair at the top of this heartless climb to glory that wasn’t meant for people who were lame. I cut a disapproving glance at this 6’4” barbarian that stood at the door heavily involved with singing along with the music that was coming from the praise team in the sanctuary. I trotted back down the stairs and lifted my mother’s fifty-pound body that felt as light as ten pounds upon my act of love to get her into the place that she wanted to be by any means necessary. By step nine, this lurch of a man snaps out of his spiritual trance and rushes down to grab my mother and carry her to her chair. I didn’t bother to say, “Thank you.” Hell, NO!! I just turned back to my running car and advised over my shoulder that I needed a minute to park my car. Hopefully, he wouldn’t be slain in the spirit and leaving my poor mother unattended and rolling back down the stairs before I returned. Hopefully, his Holy Ghost fit could wait for me to take custody of my mother.

By the time I parked and tiptoed across the rocky parking lot and up to the front door, Mother was gone. Gone? Gone. No pulse. Gone. I guess she got her miracle, huh? I’d granted her last wish, that’s all that really mattered.