Fort Benton, Montana

High on a windswept bluff in Big Sky Country, overlooking the Missouri River, my people are buried, including my dad’s parents, Logan and May Hazen, and May’s parents, Gustav and Augusta Bruesch. And now my cousin, Duane Allen Hazen.

Three years ago, we visited Riverside Cemetery, with my dad, who grew up near Fort Benton, then lived in New Jersey 63 years. When my dad died later that year, and his only surviving sibling, Uncle Herb, moved to Helena, I didn’t expect to return. Then Duane died unexpectedly. Jim and I were already planning to fly to Salt Lake City, so I bought a ticket for the Salt Lake Express to Great Falls. When I set my alarm wrong and woke up just as the van was leaving Salt Lake, Jim drove 80 miles to Tremonton, Utah, to catch it. The 15-passenger van arrived and I climbed into the only empty seat, which was sopping wet and directly under a leaky roof vent. Water dripped on me at every curve in the highway until the rain stopped and the vent emptied, but I was grateful to have a seat at all.

The memorial and graveside service were Saturday morning. Later that afternoon, I returned to the family plots and made a map. Wilbert Freddy Bruesch’s marker, flush with the ground, was covered with dirt, so on Sunday I borrowed a large stockpot and scrub brush from the church kitchen and returned once again. The red granite stone was hard to read: the raised letters are worn. They tell a sad story; my grandmother's younger brother, Wilbert, was five and a half when he died in March of 1913. Her son, Donald, died at age two in 1927. The club no one ever wants to join: my grandmother and great-grandmother lost sons too young.

Amadeus

              Months ago, Jim purchased tickets to the movie Amadeus at Boston Symphony Hall with the orchestra and chorus of the Haydn and Handel Society.

              The  stunning cinematography on a huge screen, coupled with the concert hall acoustics was nearly overwhelming.

Spoiler Alert: Mozart dies at the end. Yes, I knew that.

Near the end of Amadeus, a deathly ill Mozart dictates the Requiem “Confutatis Maledictis” (while the wicked are confounded) to Salieri. Mozart, too exhausted to continue, falls asleep. His wife returns to the apartment and confronts Salieri. When she finally turns to Mozart, she sees his open eyes lifeless and staring.

              After David died, I saw a movie character die on camera. It was such make-believe to me. How could an actor mimic a dead body?

              Tim Hulce could and did. His eyes in that death scene brought me right back to a certain August night.

              The following hearse scene transported Jim and me to our bedroom window, watching the taillights of a long, black hearse recede down the driveway. The amber turn-signal flashed silently a few times and the hearse turned towards the highway. Amadeus captures the anguish.

              Afterward the standing ovation, Jim and I sat back down, as the crowd buttoned their overcoats and moved slowly towards the exits. I nestled my head in the hollow of his shoulder and wept, overcome with emotion.

              Today, as I drove home from the Bedford Library, I realized that I would pass by David’s cemetery. I hadn’t visited his grave in months. The remaining ochre and brown leaves on the trees blended in with the dark pine boughs. I knelt on the damp grass and wiped away a few spindly pine needles and short blades of cut grass from the stone. Even now, it seems unreal.

Sunday, November 5, 1995

Thursday evening, November 2, my 39th birthday. I rode the ‘stake temple bus’ to the Washington, D.C. temple. Before the Boston Temple was opened in 2000, our stake (a collection of 10-12 congregations) sponsored a temple bus a few times a year. We’d board the bus around 9 p.m. and ride 450 miles, arriving at the temple around 5:30 a.m. After a full day of worship, the bus would take us to a motel and early next morning we’d be back at the temple. I’d get back home Saturday around midnight, sleep-deprived.

A dangerous schedule for someone who was hypomanic, but we hadn’t ever heard the term and certainly didn’t know it applied to me.

Sunday morning I was back in my head-lice-infested household. My long hair was at risk. Our dear Finnish friend, Maikku, offered to drop by and nit-pick.

Maikku and I stood in the warm autumn sun at the bottom of our kitchen porch steps. She gently combed out my long brown hair with a very fine-toothed comb. Although she was picking up houseguests at the airport, she took the time to help a desperate young mother.

By Sunday evening, I realize now, I was far gone. I believed that evil men were plotting to kidnap our oldest daughter. I’ve tried many times to describe my paranoia. It felt like certain knowledge, as if I had been in the same room with these evil men and was privy to their conversations. I think I knew I hadn’t heard a conversation, but I was certain of the danger and furious that Jim didn’t take me seriously.
No one took me seriously. They took me to the emergency department instead.