The piper or the fiddler?

Which is best? or do we really have that sort of choice when it comes to life's decisions? I don't think so, I don't really think we consider all of the pros and cons, we don't actually know them. They unfold along the way. You pay the piper up front, then tell him what to play; the fiddler is a different story; the only choice you have is to invite him in. He plays the tune and then demands payment. I don't think much in life is the piper.

Leaving home is definitely the fiddler, you know it comes with a price you can never anticipate in advance and you pay in installments. I mean leaving your home country, not just a house you grew up in, but like everything in life, if you look you will find the silver lining. Building a whole new life and hopefully grasping new opportunities. There are a lot of things you give up at the same time, some things you don't realize you are sacrificing until it hits you. In the back of the neck, or in the solar plexus perhaps.

Long before I left home and discovered the price, my siblings experienced it. Of the six of us, my younger brother and I were the only two living in Ireland, the other four were spread between Canada and the US. When my brother was involved in a car crash I wanted to let them know immediately. He was in ICU and I felt they needed to know to be prepared in case he didn't recover. My mother was determined that he would recover and didn't want to tell them until she could also tell them he was recovering. He didn't. And so the first they heard of it was that he had died. They were justifiably hurt and angry to not have been told immediately. I am quite sure they experienced other moments when the fiddler collected his installments.

For me the first, and biggest installment was when my mother died. I knew she was dying, I had been home just three months earlier and could see she was not at all well, after I returned to the US she was diagnosed with cancer and given three months to live. I phoned home regularly and felt very guilty that my two sisters were sharing the load of caring for her, as they watched her fade away while I did nothing to help. Then, at the end of April I set out with a U-Haul to drive from Texas to the San Francisco Bay Area to start a new job. That was before cell phones were a thing and smart phones had not happened. For 4 days I was on the road and out of touch. 

As soon as I got moved into my apartment in Atherton and started my new job, I called my sisters. My mother had slipped into a coma, it was just a matter of time. I called again a few days later, Thursday in the late morning to be told that she had died during the night. I was shocked. I mean, I knew she was dying as I said, but no one bothered to tell me she had actually died. I wonder still, if I had not phoned, would someone have called me eventually? Of course they would, but probably not in time for me to make it to the funeral - as it was I almost didn't make it. I scrambled to book flights and clear leave of absence with my boss of 4 days. I managed to get a massively expensive flight early next morning which would get me to Dublin with about an hour to spare before the funeral, Saturday morning. (More detailed description in Peeling The Onion Chapter 23).  

I arrived in Dublin a little later than expected after almost 23 hours of travel, so without time to change into my carefully packed black pant suit, I stood by the coffin, already closed, in blue jeans and denim jacket, complete with cowboy boots, beside my two sisters in their crisp black outfits. I was most definitely an outsider.

Following that there were many events I missed. Family gatherings; news of pregnancies were delayed; the news of the arrival of babies and the illness and departures of elderly relatives was always slow to reach me. I feel very much like, out of sight, out of mind. 

Other simple things like change of address. I eventually discovered that someone within my family circle had moved, some of them I don't have addresses for, and others could have moved, I just don't know. Admittedly, change of address is no longer as important now as change of email address, and change of cell phone number almost never happens.

So many times I reminded myself that when the Irish first started leaving home to come to America, they left everything behind, often never to be heard of again. Letters took months to reach their destination, if they ever did, so any news that was received was already months old. Plus, I was the one who made the decision to leave and separate myself from the life that continued there without me.

Strangely enough, the pandemic and virtual communication, even within families living in the same city, actually reduced this feeling of isolation. At least, it meant that family gatherings were held virtually and I could join and was just like everyone else, a picture on the screen. 

What was very odd about that is once we all signed off, I was left with an empty feeling; I still didn't belong, snippets of conversation make no sense as they were probably a continuation of something I wasn't part of some other time. Silly I know but unexpected. As I said, you never really know what you are giving up until you discover it is gone.

Of course, there are always silver linings to every situation. For 27 years I have been removed from the sibling squabbles and demands. I get to go home to visit (or at least I did before the pandemic) and get treated like a welcome visitor. Though I know I do disrupt their normal routine, they make a space for me. Some have tried to tell me I was lucky to have been so far removed when my mother was dying; that was not a silver lining, I can never think of it as anything but a loss. I wish I could have been there to help my sisters care for my mother. But selfishly, I wish I could have been there to get those last weeks and moments with my mother.

It is called paying the fiddler. I made my choices and I would do the same again because it is a path that brought me to where I am now. It is true that nothing in this life is free.

"Everything has a price. It's just what your willing to pay for it.  - Anne Bishop