The longest line

I hate standing in long lines. But, we make of it what we can.

We once stood in Central Park for the chance to get tickets to Shakespeare at the Public Theater. We arrived at the end of the line early in the morning, before the ticket office opened. The line was already very long but it grew behind us. While we waited for the line to start moving, we took turns grabbing little cat naps off the side of the path on the lawn and sipping coffee, eating bagels and small oranges. 

When the line finally started to move slow and steady we were still far from sight of the box office. But we became hopeful. We had gone into this with little hope of getting tickets but liked the idea of an adventure and were determined to try. Besides, what better way to enjoy a beautiful early summer morning in New York, than by gathering with family and friends and watching the people and the cool morning giving way to the sunshine warming the park. 

Finally, just as we could see the box office, some theatrical people who were not in the play but worked in the box office, walked down the line telling us all in loud happy theatrical voices that the box office was out of tickets and the line began to disperse.

We are all standing in the long inevitable line of life. Toward the end of the line it doesn’t look like a line at all. It is a teeming mass of humanity bumping into each other, trying to figure out which direction to go and why all of these people are in our way. By the time we realize we are in a line, we also realize we are in the line from the moment of our birth until our last breath. There is no getting out of the line and we all get the big ticket whether we want it or not.

The line of life is random to be sure. Your trip through the line can be long and uneventful or sadly, tragically, much too short. There is no sign saying “You must be this tall to ride”. Unlike elementary school, you can’t be sent to the end of the line. 

There is no front of the line but the longer you move through the line, the more keenly aware you become that your time in the line is growing short.

My mother in law, Bonnie, has entered the ‘keenly aware’ phase of the line. She is 84. She has a diagnosis. She has been handed a standby ticket. 

This is not a woman I have always gotten along with but, with each visit with a doctor, I am more regretful of any of my words or actions that may have caused her grief. This is the natural course for those of us just a little further back in the line.

Each of us can only atone for ourselves and should not expect any expression of atonement before someone disappears from the line. Folks like Bonnie are excused from making amends or a list of apologies. They have far more important business before they step out of the line and we should all respect that as we would want it respected for us. 

On previous occasions when I have accompanied a loved one as they neared the end, I have discovered their burden is only matched by their dignity and grace. In that, all that needs to be said or that we think needs to be said is wiped away and we are left with love, respect, mercy or redemption.

My mother in law and I are redeemed in that a couple of years back we recognized each other in the line and decided to be less judgmental of each other. We were barely waving distance from each other and neither of us could really say who was ahead of the other. It was time to show a little respect, each of us realizing we both have a relatively short time left in line, compared to the time we have spent in the line.

In reality we are only 16 years apart in age so when we honked at an “old” lady or got frustrated at some slow moving “old” man in the grocery store, we were really just talking about people standing near us in the line, saw ourselves in a reflection. 

I began to show her the deference I hoped people would show me and she accepted a few of my more obvious shortcomings and even complimented me on what a wonderful job her daughter and I had done in raising three pretty amazing young men. That compliment meant the world to me.

I am sincerely unequivocal in my praise of her pottery and painting. I love her art. For a long time, I had stereotyped her as the 60’s mom who worked part-time and did art part-time but in reality she had been a young woman who had been accomplished at music and art at a young age, obtained a college degree in art, got married, became a mom, taught high school art, became an interior designer, took her kids to Morocco, and summoned even more tenacity when her husband died in his mid-50’s. In context of her life and times, it was a terrible mistake on my part not to acknowledge her as an artist who also happened to be a mother and a teacher. 

Recently, I remembered to thank her again for the amazing wedding party she put on for my wife and me all those years ago and I remembered to acknowledge her as a good mother/advocate/role model who nurtured two strong daughters and one strong son. 

Bonnie seems to appreciate me now, though she doesn’t suffer fools lightly. I don’t mind walking on a few egg shells to stay in her good graces. Her little dog, Sammy, gets excited when he sees me and I am quite fond of him. Bonnie seems to trust our judgment of character.

Bonnie likes it when I watch a little football with her and cheer for her team without asking her how she is feeling or if she is in pain or if she needs anything. She enjoys it when I take her scrambled eggs and a couple of slices of perfectly browned, uncured turkey bacon, but as her appetite fades even eating that is a chore. 

The line winds through the park and around the lake and where our path ends, none of us can know. Are we lifted and float away? Do we take a conscious step and disappear? Do we sort of “pop” like a bubble emerging at the surface, dispersing into the atmosphere, rising up into space and helping forming a new star?  Do the people we love far below look up and smile and say, “I never noticed that star before?”

In our head do we hear a countdown? Do we get to pick which number the countdown starts with? 

Does a voice say to us, “You’ve reached the end of the line. While your service here is complete, humanity wants you to know how much we appreciate your effort, good nature and patience while you have been standing in the line.” 

At the moment we leave the line, do we have an instant, where we export a memory that plays in a loop in infinity, part of the soul – a beautiful day in a park drinking coffee and eating bagels and fruit and napping on the lawn, waiting to get Shakespeare tickets with people you love? 

If, at the moment we exit the line, no matter the circumstances of our earthly demise, our thoughts when it is our time can only be filled with beauty and love, then I guess there really is a heaven and it makes all this standing around in line worthwhile.