Eric Forbes

I’m lucky enough to have grandparents from both sides still alive at my age (43) but have a nagging sense of loss over the fact that of the four grandparents still alive, I can only access two of them. Years ago, a family feud ensued that drew a line in sand between my father’s side of the family and ours, essentially making communication between us impossible. It’s been over 20 years since that disagreement. It’s been a long time.

This morning, I thought about the times I’ve lost with my grandmother Ruth (my Dad’s mother) and how many times I think of her off and on even though we haven’t spoken or seen each other for well over a decade. I find it hard to believe that adults from the same family can behave this way, and yet, as proof-positive, we can. All of us on both sides of the disagreement fence have decided to just let things be as they are. As if that in itself is saying anything! How else could these things be?

We could be closer. We could be honest. We could be more loving. But we are not. The grandparents I idolized throughout my childhood might as well be dead but they’re not dead. Not really. Death is a finality that I cannot change. But something tells me that there’s a way to change this situation. I’ve tried to reach out in the past. I sent a CD of my piano music a few years ago, but I never got a reply. I didn’t expect that I would, but I sent it anyway. I wanted my grandmother to hear what I had been working on lately, since she was the one that promoted my music while I was a boy and was the one I wanted to impress.

This thought of grandma holds me back. It keeps me stuck.

Like an anchor,
holding me still.
the memory of you
lives on in me
with every note
with every chord
with anything Chopin
I think of you

Thinking of you is bitter
and sweet. The loss of you
is unmentionably awful
like a car wreck in the dead of night
in the middle of winter
with icy roads and drunk drivers
racing much too fast
someone is bound to get hurt
and yet… it’s nothing like this.

A quarrel. A series of lies.
A foundation of insecurities
decimated by sudden storms
nothing remaining but memories
of times never spent together
of conversations we never had
of tears we might have shed
in each other’s presence

finding each other as we did
and losing each other as we do
I never got over the loss of you

sitting together at the piano
you watching me read the notes
giving me the courage to play things
I could not possibly play:
Claire de Lune as one example

The same time I tried to (and now) play
that piece, I was learning Bach etudes
and couldn’t possibly learn something
from Debussy — yet I did and I do

How did you know what I could do?
How did your support get me so far?

Was it love?
I’m sure that’s it. I can feel it now as I write this
And yet you’ll never see this, I’m sure
your world is there while mine is here
world’s apart, never to be joined

in harmony or dissoance
with words or without
I try to live without you
and physically this is true, I do
but inside, deep down inside
you’re still there, egging me on.

/ /

There was an idea I had that lead me to this new blog post in the first place:

We wake up and make tea at your place. The sun has just begun to rise above the hills. Your garden faces towards the kitchen window, inviting us to take a closer look. The weather is brisk and cool, fresh and clean. We look into each other’s eyes and say nothing. There is nothing to say. This is the time we spend together: morning tea in the garden. And nothing in words could make sense of how this feels.

We recognize each other as orphans. Your abandonment was physical. Your parents were no where to be found. Mine was psychological. I saw them but never connected. Part of our alliance comes from a common experience. Our world is solitary and determined. We rely on others sparingly, in small doses, in small groups. There is no collection of friends for us. We have each other and our family. That will have to be enough.