Never Forgotten

There are a handful of days or events from my past where I remember every detail of where I was, how I was feeling, who was there, what was said, etc. When recalling the memories, I sometimes feel the same excitement, fear, sadness, or happiness just as if the day were repeating itself in the here and now. My wedding, the birth of each of my children, the explosion of the Space Shuttle Challenger, the shooting of President Reagan, the shootings at Columbine, and of course 9/11.

November 10th, 1995 is one of those days. A day that I vividly remember everything that happened the entire day, the entire night, the entire weekend, and the entire week that followed.

I worked that day but left early because I hadn't felt any movement from the baby that was a week overdue. My mother picked me up when she got out of work at 3:00 to bring me to the hospital so they could check on things. The nurse reassured me that the baby was very active and everything was fine. So we left, I dropped my mother off at her house since I was using her car (my brother had borrowed mine for a few weeks and my husband worked 2nd shift so he had our truck), I picked up Molly from daycare, and we went home.

After I fed her, played with her, bathed her, read to her, and put her to bed, I sat on the rocking chair in my living room surprised that I was still awake. I remembered that my brother hadn't called me back the night before like he said he was going to so I figured I'd give him a call. I got his answering machine and left a message. I didn't have anything important to discuss with him and we talked four or five times a week, even though it was long distance, and I was bored.

After reading the paper I went to bed and fell right asleep. A little while the phone next to my bed rang. Still asleep, I picked up and said hello. My mother was on the other end and asked me if I could bring her car to her. Obviously, I was quite confused as to why she needed her car all of a sudden but she just kept telling me that she wanted me to bring it over to her. Knowing something was wrong, I finally just asked her what was going on. That was when she broke down and said that my brother Bryan had been killed in a car accident.

I remember feeling the stinging in my nose as the tears welled up in my eyes. I remember feeling my stomach drop. I remember questioning "what?", and then "how", and "when". I remember saying "oh my god, oh my god" and then I remember thinking that I had to get control of myself and saying and repeating "I can't think about this right now" to which my mother replied "no Shelley, you need to". I asked if she had called my father and she said yes. I told her I'd be right over.

I hung up from her and called my father but neither one of us could say anything. I finally just said that I would see him at my mother's house. Then I called my husband's work. His supervisor answered the phone and I asked for Duane. He was all excited and asked me if I was having the baby to which I replied "No, but it's really important". He quickly got Duane and I told him the news and said that I would meet him at my mother's house. Before I had time to process anymore, I called my best friend. The first thing she asked me was if I was having the baby. I told her no and then told her that Bryan had died.

I grabbed Molly from her crib and loaded her and a bag of clothes into the car. I remember driving up Curran Highway and staring off into the fields wishing it were all a dream. I met up with everyone at the house. Within the hour the house was full of aunts, uncles, and close family friends. My mother was rightfully distraught. My father was withdrawn. My husband was quiet. And I was in the bedroom trying desperately to reach my sister. She lived in Maryland I knew that trying to reach her on a Friday night was going to be tough. In between phone calls to her answering machine and friends of friends that might know where she was, I was calling the airlines to book a flight for the next morning.

When I wasn't talking to her friends, or the airlines, I was trying to reach the police department in Rochester, NY that handled the accident. I wanted, or needed, to know what had happened. "Had he been drinking?" was the question that I really wanted to know (another day I may post why that was so important to me). It took many calls, many of which were 911 operators, before I was finally able to speak to an officer that had been at the scene. His assumption was that Bryan had been hunting and may have fallen asleep at the wheel. There were no other cars involved. I didn't ask details about the accident, probably because I was somewhat relieved that alcohol may not have been involved.

At some point during the night I was finally able to speak with Jessica. While talking with her, I realized why my mother had tried to get me to come to her house when she had called me earlier, she didn't want to give that kind of news over the phone, and I felt the same way. By the time I exited from the bedroom, most of our friends and relatives had left. I went to bed and tried to sleep, not too successfully.

Before daybreak, while still lying awake in bed I remember thinking "opening day". It was the first day of deer season in Vermont and it just didn't seem right that Bryan would never hunt again.

My parents went to the airport that day. Hearing my mother bawl while taking a shower was excrutiating. A few more people stopped by the house. Relatives, close friends who heard from friends, the funeral director. I went to Walmart to buy paper plates, knapkins, coffee. I ran into my mother's neighbor who was surprised to see that I was still pregnant. She had assumed that with all the cars and activity at the house that I had had the baby. "No, no baby yet". It was becoming an automatic response.

I slept a little better that night. Woke up at 5:00 with contractions. Knowing that it would be hours before the baby would come, I didn't say anything to my husband so he could go hunting for a few hours. I kept the pains to myself over the next couple of hours until my parents left for the funeral parlor so they could make all the arrangements and pick out a casket. The obituary ran in the Sunday paper so more people came by the house, mostly friends of my father's. I tried to play hostess but it was getting more and more difficult with the contractions increasing, both in frequency and pain. My friend Sue stopped by with a plate of food and she took over my hostesting duties. I remember sitting on the corner of the couch, tryint to focus on what my long lost uncle was trying to say to me but thinking "oh my god, will you just shut the hell up, do I look like I care about your stupid story". He had no clue.

The contractions were getting pretty painful so I tried walking them off a little but that just increased the pain and decreased the time between them so I sat back down. Soon my parents got home. My father panicked when he saw that I was in labor. He went in search of my husband, who was still hunting. I wasn't worried, I knew he'd be back soon, he never stayed in the woods that long. He was an amateur.

The television was on and I started to watch the Dolphins vs Patriot game. Once they got back, we headed to the hospital. ALL OF US. My mother, my father, my husband, my friend Sue. The nurse was not happy to have all those people in the room, especially my father who was going through all the cabinets, trying on safety glasses, or my husband who was turning the tv to the football game. She tried to tell him that it was my day and he should not worry about the game to which he replied "she told me to put the game on".

Soon the doctor came in to check on my progress. He broke my water and told me that the baby would be coming within the next hour. We didn't know if it was a boy or girl but we were all, quietly thinking to ourselves that it would be a boy.  And it was.