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 February 15, 2007 Thursday – 8:15am I write to you seated beside a hospital bed situated in our living room for Janice’s comfort. Asian carpets, leather chairs, a grand piano, even a bank of windows can’t distract any of us in this house from the truth: Janice is no longer commandeering the stairs, no longer traversing from this room to that, no longer bothering to pretend she’s as able as the next to make small talk. Janice is dying. Yesterday, we knew that from now on, everything will take place from this bed: meals, baths, conversations, complaints, physical relief. As I type, as she sleeps, her lungs rumble and she breathes with great difficulty. If I had an old fashioned typewriter, the sort with keys that register the difference between a light touch and a good slamming; if that was my instrument of communication, these words would be indented. I am helpless, so helpless to stop what is happening and not even my fingers can prove it. The words fly to the page in exactly the same way they would if I were writing about pumping gas. I resent the absence of howling on this page. This morning, before starting this Update, I called for the Hospice nurse to come. We have questions. We have one question: “Where are we along this heart-breaking journey?” Well, we have a second: “How hard is this for Janice?” But, let me back up a bit. Let me get you to today. On February 2, I flew to Boston. Two things were to be accomplished during my stay there: first, a visit with our boys. I helped Taylor prepare admission papers for Art School and then Friday night I stomped down dark and narrow stairs to a basement club, feeling my age with the impact of every young person’s shoulder hurrying past me. I was the old guy dressed in black at the back of the room, there to hear Elliott’s band, “Hats and Glasses.” Then, there was a day of work. I spent most of Saturday with a client who was in town to speak. Saturday night, I would approach the primary purpose of my visit. Our sons and I would talk about what it means, what it requires of us, to face their mother’s impending death. They needed to understand that we have only weeks, or at best, months with her. On Thursday, before I left Friday, our dear friend, Barb Pine flew in to stay with Janice during my absence. Speaking to her by phone Friday, Taylor had asked, “Will you be there when we get home next Friday? We’d like to talk.” She wouldn’t. Her plan was to leave Monday, after my mid-Sunday return. However, Life, or at least the threat of death blurs even the best of plans. Saturday evening, after good conversations with the boys, while I was packing for an early Sunday flight, I got a concerned call from Barb. She and Janice had been sitting at the kitchen table, Barb reading e-mails to Janice who was slowly attempting to put food to her mouth. Suddenly, Janice motioned for help up. She was gagging and wanted to reach the sink. Barb got her there where she gagged, but on nothing. When they turned to return to the table, Janice collapsed, tried to stand, fell into what appeared to be a mild seizure, collapsed again against Barb who managed to get her seated. Janice gained consciousness – of sorts. She turned to the empty chair to her right and began a conversation. “Janice,” Barb said, softly touching her arm. Janice turned to her left, faced her friend then said, “I’ve been talking to people who aren’t here, haven’t I.” “You have.” The short version of a very long and frightening story is this: all plans, all projections, changed with Barb’s call to me. Janice had dropped into a state of near unconsciousness. A Hospice nurse came, arriving at about the same time as our friend Bonnie who dropped everything in preparation for international travel to be in our home in case Barb needed help through the night. “Her pulse is racing, I can’t get a reading on blood pressure,” said the nurse. “I can’t say how long it will be but I can tell you she has begun dying.” “Jim. Barb.” It went something like that. The news she shared was terrifying. I tried desperately to get home that night only to learn that airlines don’t respond to panic. I would leave the next morning as scheduled. Only this proved to be good news. Because it was Super bowl Sunday and nearly everyone who wanted to fly that weekend, had. I was able to call our boys, book them on my flight, pick them up before the sun was up on Sunday and bring them home. In Nashville, friends Steve and Deb packed up a lunch, picked us up and raced us home. Expecting the worst, instead we found a determined Janice groomed, fresh, sitting in her brown leather chair ready to hug and kiss her boys. However, in the middle of the room was the evidence of crisis. Bonnie and Barb had dragged a twin mattress from the upstairs landing, settled their very weak friend on it, then kept a sweet and bleary-eyed vigil through the night; hoping, praying that Janice would live long enough to see her men. Live she did. Janice rallied and for the next three days stayed fairly stable. The important thing is that she and the boys managed to “love on each other,” tell stories, exchange words, share tears, know that they were giving and taking what would ever be treasured. Barb stayed with us an extra day, leaving Tuesday morning. She and the boys got their conversations. Our friend Vicki flew in from Southern California on Tuesday night. Hospice brought the hospital bed and with Janice’s firm and hilarious comments about feng shui, we got it situated to please her. Still, come night, gently aided by her boys, Janice went upstairs to be in our bed. It has been unbelievably precious to watch our sons care for their mother, lifting her, moving her from room to room, feeding her, getting her comfortable in bed, talking and laughing and weeping with her. Janice has given us many things but the gift of her grace in these moments is beyond description. Some day, Taylor may draw it; someday, Elliott may produce lyrics about it. Presently? It’s all we can do to absorb it. Monday, Lauren, the Hospice social worker came and helped us all through the difficult discussion about arrangements for dying, for what to do after death. She commented that this seems to be a family “where no one seems to have trouble expressing an opinion.” Welcome to the Chaffee home. One of our priests, Randy Hoover Dempsey was there with us and after the meeting, prayed with us. Tuesday, Janice’s mom, Bobbie, arrived after a twelve hour flight from Alaska. She and Vicky have been a great asset in keeping up with house tasks, freeing the boys and me to be with Janice, work, tend to terrible tasks that death requires. I’m thinking back now, on last week. Wednesday night. Was it February 5th? Our Food Club came. Only, given the situation, the guest list was greatly expanded – and so was the joy. The evening became one of the most profound times in my life. First, our house was full of people - house-guests, the Food Club members, our boys and a friend or three of theirs who happened to hanging out. Janice was in her bed “holding court,” talking, laughing and crying with dear, dear, friends. The house was booming with voices and deep love. My kitchen was filled with spilled food, cooking food, tasting food and minor food fights. I loved it. After the fun and after the feast, Randy returned and together we read from the Common Book of Prayer, shared the Eucharist and we finished the evening singing and praying. Call it community, friendship, whatever term you find appropriate. What I received from that night was a profound sense of God’s presence. What I realize as the evening progressed was how thoroughly, how naturally, the night became a tribute to Janice and how holy that tribute became. We casually pooled a variety of personalities and ages and attitudes around plenty food and drink in the presence of our God and watched as everything was transformed. I can’t describe the power of such love or the significance of closing the evening at the Lord’s table, celebrating the life He has given us. Then . . . there was the rest of that week. Friends came and went. Janice has progressively weakened. By Friday, she knew it required too much effort to come upstairs so now, she spends her nights and days in the hospital bed. Saturday we said a difficult goodbye to Vicki then welcomed the arrival of another dear friend, Teresa who flew in from Denver. Over the past 2 ½ weeks we have had representation from each part of Janice’s life in our home, helping and confirming the incredible niche my wife carves in the hearts of others. So, I sit in the living room, beside her bed, writing and witnessing a beautiful Tennessee morning. It is 15-degrees outside and the deer are grazing nearby in woods lightly dusted with snow. My precious Janice sleeps, noisly breathing and with difficulty. Her face is drawn, her skin so thin that it is as if all the tiny vessels are ready to break through the surface, her feet and hands, cold. She waits. We wait. During this morning I have been struck with the reality that my wife is not coming back. She will never again sit up and make one of her wisecracks to put me in my place; never laugh with me or respond when asked how long we have been married by saying, “Not long enough.” I will never again share her bed, her body; never attend church with her, fly to some far away city or sit around a dinner table with her and the boys. Regardless of the time left, these things will never again happen. Today, I am very sad. Very, very sad. Still, it is consistent to say, May the peace of Christ bless you and keep you. And today, may you hold those in your house close to your body and feel them breath and take in their remarkable scent and give them your love. Jim PS. Later today the hospice nurse came by to confirm that we were in the last hours of Janice’s life. Her feet are cold, her breath shallow. Randy and Jerry, our priest’s, came by once again to share the Eucharist. Janice sat up and looked directly in my eyes during this time and then peacefully laid back down. Our dear friends Jim and Karen Schmidt are here tonight, along with Tom and Dori Howard, Teresa, and our boys. We rest in the confidence that even though she doesn’t respond she can hear what is going on. During dinner we played the Sisters record. There is a fire in the fireplace, my parents fly in tomorrow, and we wait. "All material, unless otherwise noted, are owned and copyrighted by Janice Chaffee and James Chaffee, © 2004, 2005, 2006. Permission is granted to forward e-mails, or print for personal use only. No portion of these updates may be quoted in part or whole in any published material or on any internet site without authorization from authors.” |
