I had spent my entire adult life searching for it, for that sense of wholeness, calmness, and ease of existence that could never quite manifest within me. Integration. Whenever I had felt it, it was always too fleeting of an experience to hold, deconstruct, dissect, or connect to anything else in any meaningful way. These isolated experiences of integration remained suspended in time, never taking shape or possessing any broader meaning until now. But the faint line that had always connected these events was now suddenly demanding to be seen. And in this new light, with my mother now gone, frozen pictures began to melt back to life and merge into a moving, living story with a tangible purpose. Integration, it turned out, was not as intangible as I had always feared. It was simply the finality we were all moving towards as we made our way through this world.
My mother died on a Sunday. Two weeks prior to her death is when I began to miss her like crazy. It felt as if some part of me was remembering what was about to unfold. I typically called my parents about once or twice a week, but I was now calling my mom every day, sometimes twice a day. She had been suffering from kidney failure for several years and was scheduled to have surgery on her arm in preparation for dialysis in the coming months. She was terrified and I sensed that despite her own fear of death, which I imagine tends to be more pronounced in families made up of atheists, that she was beginning to question whether the associated risks of dialysis would even be worth it.
Doctors were telling my mom that if she went through with the dialysis, that it could prolong her life for about another two years or so, but it was unlikely to be much longer than that. Without dialysis, she might have another twelve months to live. This was not encouraging news to say the least. Yet, there seemed to be time, according to what the doctors were saying.
Still, I felt this sensation inside of me that’s hard to describe. The brain connection that bonded my mother and me seemed to be screaming out, “Be there with her!” But I had my job and my young children to take care of. And Potsdam, New York isn’t the easiest town to get to in the middle of winter. One night as I did the dishes I found myself creating a melody that seemed filled with desperation, and then the lyrics below followed soon after:
“Fly To You”
Once you painted this town
Now you’re bringin' me down
Talkin' 'bout all your failing ways
You used to be free
Now you’re living through me
Hoping that I won't make mistakes
Here I am, the mirror image of your former youth
Understand that I'm miles away but I'll always live for you
You make me want to fly, fly to you
Just jump into the sky, and fly to you
Dying slowly for years
Refusing all that you hear
Still so stubborn and set in stone
Rather sleep than just speak
Rather die than be weak
Wants the world to just let you go
Here I am, the spitting image of your golden youth
Understand, that I'm miles away, but I'll always live for you
You make me want to fly, fly to you
Just jump into the sky, and fly to you
Oh, you live a little, you live a little
Hoping it’s just a dream
Oh, you wake in sorrow
Maybe tomorrow
You will truly be
You will truly be
You will truly be… free
You make me want to fly, fly to you
Just jump into the sky, and fly to you
You make me want to fly, fly to you
Just jump into the sky, and fly to you
When I wrote the song, “Fly To You,” I recall feeling desperate, in need; knowing I was about to experience a great loss. The lyrics also speak to the power of intuition. I had written it two weeks before my mother died, despite having been told that she would have, at the very least, another year to live. Yet, from the lyrics you can taste the sense of urgency I had been experiencing at that time.
Something inside me knew, beyond the facts and statistics I was being presented with, that my mom was about to die. In retrospect, I could easily torture myself for not following my intuition, packing my bags, and jumping on a plane to see her. But I was seemingly stuck in Maryland and would have to do what I could for her over the phone. But even my years as a crisis hotline counselor would fall short of preparing me for what was to come.
My goal during this time, leading up to my mother’s death, was to be supportive of whatever she decided to do with respect to dialysis. I wanted her to feel empowered to make her own decisions. Feeling ill equipped to counsel my own mother around the process of dying, however, I found myself suddenly drawn to any information about death that I could get my hands on. I began to read cross-cultural interpretations of death and dying. I even scolded myself for not majoring in religious studies in school, something that, for the first time ever, was beginning to seem like the most useful major one could ever pursue. “Jesus,” I thought, “what in life prepares you to help someone you love die? Especially if you have been raised in a house full of atheists?” College certainly fell short. My entire life had fallen short.
Although I advise and counsel for a living, death has never really been a part of the conversation, except for when I was a suicide hotline counselor while attending college and graduate school. And even then, the goal was to talk people into living rather than assisting them with embracing what I now believe is a beautiful transition to what lies beyond. But at that time, for me at least, death was simply a euphemism for decomposition and “the end.” It was, after all, what I had been taught my entire life.
The day before my mother died, I walked through the empty halls of Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore, while my seven-year-old daughter leapt and twirled to the live pianist in her ballet class. I listened to my voice echo and bounce off the high ceilings as I told my mother, over the phone, that I didn’t want her to go through with dialysis just for me. That’s when she began to cry. Her voice trembled as she confided to me that she was scared. “What if your father is right?” she asked. “What if there is nothing after you die?” I reminded her that nobody knew what happens after death, not even dad. I said that as smart as he was, he certainly had no memory of dying before, so why choose him to listen to? “Why not choose yourself?” I asked. I continued with my questioning.
“Why even allow his beliefs to enter your mind? How do you actually feel right now?”
My mom let out a short laugh.
“Well, actually,” she said, “I have been feeling amazing all week! You know, sometimes I go into remission and it’s like I’m 20 years younger. I’ve had so much energy these past few days. It’s crazy!”
The next day was Sunday. My mother and I spoke in the morning and again at 7pm that same evening. Two and a half hours later, a sudden brain aneurysm, likely caused by a spike in blood pressure, would kill her in less than two seconds. The winter Olympics were taking place in Russia, and my mother was in a happier mood than usual, because one of the events that day was ice skating, her favorite.
She went on to tell me how she had felt so energized that entire day. She couldn’t quite describe where the energy had come from. She had vacuumed the entire house, disinfected all of the bathrooms, she had washed my father’s winter coat, and had even given him a haircut. All a far cry from the helpless, sick woman who could barely stay awake for more than 20 minutes at a time only a couple of weeks earlier. It was as if she was already in the process of transcending to another realm and was preparing the world for her absence.
It is quite possible that in those final hours, her blood pressure was through the roof, unbeknownst to anyone, which was what was causing the surge in energy. But nobody suspected it. She was just so full of life that day. We simply thought it was a remission like the ones she had previously experienced.
My mother and I went back to talking about the Olympics and the opening ceremony. Like the rest of the world, we had both been completely mesmerized by that breathtaking performance. The entire stage had been transformed into a body of frozen water.
“Did you see the ice formations moving across the stage? The way they split apart and floated away from each other? Wasn’t that beautiful?” I asked.
“It was simply stunning,” my mom replied. “It was my favorite part.” It had been mine too.
Then I put my daughter on the phone to say goodnight. My mom was so happy and I was so happy for her. I wanted to hold on to that moment forever because I wasn’t sure when I’d hear her feeling so energetic again. Before we hung up, my mom said, “I LOVE YOU” to me. I choose to bold and all cap that because she said it differently than usual. I even thought that at the time she said it. She said it as if she had put her entire self into that one sentence; as if she, too, was remembering what was about to unfold and was hoping that those three words, I LOVE YOU, if said with the right emphasis, would carry me through to the other side of grief, just in case my father had been right.
It was nearly 10pm when I heard my cell phone ringing in my bedroom, down the hall on the third floor. I spat the toothpaste out of my mouth and made a mad dash for the phone. I somehow knew that something had happened to my mother, having felt uneasy since saying our goodbyes just a couple of hours earlier. My father was in a panic and he was speaking much faster than usual.
“Darian, your mother stopped breathing 20 minutes ago and emergency responders are trying to resuscitate her.” His voice grew louder. “I have to go! I am going to follow the ambulance to the hospital. I will call you back.” And then he hung up.
What I remember most from that call, along with its brevity, was the silence in the background. Other than the sound of my father’s voice, there was no noise whatsoever. It was as if my dad had called me from a space deep below the earth. It didn’t sound as if people were fighting to keep my mother alive. It sounded like she had already died. And she already had. I immediately called my mother’s brother, Uncle Ben and his wife, Aunt Barb. I still wasn’t clear at the time on whether my mom was dead or alive or someplace in between, but my room was spinning as I stood next to my bed, holding on to its edge to keep me steady.
My husband came upstairs from his bedroom on the second floor when he heard me explaining to my mother’s family that I still had no news, but had feared the worst. Jason walked into my room and asked what he could do; whether I wanted him to stay with me or not. Although I couldn’t tell you when or how we had come to the conclusion that having our own bedrooms on separate floors was a good idea, I remember thinking, at the time, that it seemed weird to see him in my room. I shook my head no and turned towards the wall to continue my conversation with my uncle.
Only a few weeks prior to this, one of the other moms from my daughter’s ballet class had recommended the book, “The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying,” when I explained that I was searching for books on the topic. The book has 423 pages in it. By this point, I had only gotten to page 208. I never did get past that page. “Shit, I’m not done with the book yet. I’m not ready for this!” I thought. I reluctantly climbed into my bed, sat in the middle of it looking towards my ceiling and tried to recall the aura of calm and peace that the book was teaching me to embrace. Tears slowly dropped off my face as I began to whisper, hoping Jason wouldn’t hear me in case he was sitting in the stairwell. I hadn’t heard his footsteps on his way out and wasn’t sure where he had gone.
“Mom, I forgive you.” The thought kept repeating in my mind. I imagined that all of the love in my heart was enveloping her in warmth and lifting her towards a higher plane. “I know you did the best you could, and I wouldn’t trade you for any other mom in the world.” I began to cry harder. “If you’re already gone, I don’t want you to worry about anything. I’ll take care of Dad. I’ll take care of my sister. Just set yourself free. I love you. I love you. I love you.” Higher and higher I imagined her going.
Still, there was no news. As I sat there, unable to lie down, I began to think hard about my relationship with my mother. A small part of me was somehow still hurting over something that had happened between us over twenty years ago. And although our relationship had evolved and mended since then, it was apparent to me now that I had never completely forgiven her until this very moment. Then I found myself rehashing it all over again in my mind.
I had been twenty-two years old, living in a room, in a church that had once housed my father’s medical practice. It was a Nazareth church that had moved its congregation to a larger location. I remember “house hunting” with my parents as a child, while they located an acceptable building to put his practice. When they found the church, my dad was delighted. “Yes, I will buy God’s house and save lives in it,” he said to me sarcastically, in his Persian accent, as he pinched my cheek in excitement.
I remember some of my father’s patients telling me how they were comforted by the fact that their doctor shared a house with God. If they had only known my father well enough to understand his reasoning for having his practice in that church, they would have been horrified. Unbeknownst to them, there had been a life-long, one-sided competition between my father and this so-called “God.” Over the course of his lifetime, my father has spent countless hours writing about the topic, believing to have successfully disproven the existence of both God and the soul.
By the time I was twenty-two, however, my dad had long lost his license to practice medicine. The “church,” his former medical practice, sat empty, saving no one. My father had been accused of malpractice four years earlier. He and my mother did not take the allegations seriously at first because they were certain that this was a set-up to force my family to move out of town. Administrators at the local hospital had been trying to get us to leave for years. Racial and ethnic minorities were not necessarily welcomed there to say the least. It’s a difficult thing to try to explain to someone who is not from a small, American town. An unspoken language can exist in them that is nearly impossible to detect at first. The air in those towns can be sickening to breathe, because it is filled with so much quiet hatred, hidden behind smiles and niceties.
To make matters worse, my father was brilliant, arrogant, and, at times, condescending. And like my mother, he spoke his mind and always valued honesty, no matter what the cost was. My father wouldn’t play along with hospital politics and when folks at the hospital really messed up, which seemed to be more often than one would expect, he was always the first to shed light on any malpractice, informing families what had really gone down. Not only was my father at war with God, he seemed to be at war with the younger hospital administration as well. Although people of color weren’t getting lynched anymore, their livelihoods were apparently fair game. And although my father was Iranian rather than African American, it was all the same to those who were white and had lived in that town for generations.
It was all too common to hear how “that new black doctor got ran out of town,” when overhearing the local gossip. The thing was, the “black” doctor in those stories was always new. It would take years for me to realize that the reason for this was that they never lasted long enough in that town to be anything other than new, to become familiar faces in the community. These professionals were threatened in the small, horrific ways that you rarely hear about. But these types of experiences have a way of familiarizing their victims with a whole other language that only minorities understand and recognize as being threatening. “Why Hello, Dr. Bassim, how are you doing today?” didn’t necessarily mean that a person was interested in how my dad was doing. What it really meant was, “Wow, I can barely believe you still live here, Dr. Bassim. It shocks me that we haven’t gotten rid of you yet.”
It never took long for families who came from rich and diverse backgrounds to take their children out of school and move someplace more populated, a place where they could remain more anonymous, but not us. And although my mother had warned my father that staying in that town was going to be a huge mistake, he refused to be bullied. He still refuses to leave to this day. Even though he has lost everything, including my mother, I doubt he will ever leave.
At the time the allegations were first made against my father, my family tried to stick together and fight the good fight. But in time, the story would be covered throughout the media. My father’s malpractice story was now on TV, on the radio, and in all of the local papers. Friends living four hours away in Albany, New York were calling to tell us they had seen the story on the six o’clock news. The constant scrutiny from others began to make it more and more impossible to live a normal life in that town. My mom no longer felt comfortable leaving the house, dreading the weekly trip to the grocery store. People began to prank call us, in the evenings, saying disgusting things when we picked up the phone. But as stifling as the air was in that town, the air in my house had become far worse to breathe. The atmosphere at home with my parents had become deadening. It felt like the four of us were locked away in a madhouse that was slowly getting sucked underground.
Living in that house with my parents eventually became too much for me, so I decided to take advantage of my father’s abandoned church and moved into what had been his former medical practice. I slept in a small, windowless room that was positioned in the center of the building and had three doors on three of its four walls. One of the doors led to a larger room that had once been my father’s office. The second door led to what had once been the reception area. The third door led to a small bathroom. In my father’s former office, sat his desk with piles of medical books stacked on it. Years’ worth of dust collected everywhere. The windows in that room were gorgeous, tall stained-glass windows with arched tops. Two of these windows faced east. On warmer days, I would open the door leading to my father’s office and let the sun beam multiple hues of purple, gold, and red into my small, dark room.
That small room is where I kissed a woman for the first time a few months later. Her name was Sophia. She was an international student from Italy who was studying music at the Crane School of Music. She alternated between playing the keyboard and drums in a band that performed in town on the weekends. I had been casually dating the male singer in that band, whose name was Ethan Jones. But mostly, I just wanted to hang out with him so that I could be near Sophia.
In time, I was singing in the band as well; trying to work up the courage to tell Sophia that I liked her. I still hadn’t had sex with anyone by that point and was pretty sure I was the last living virgin on earth. Then one night, after a Halloween party that Sophia and I had gone to together, I invited her back to the church where I lived. I hung up our coats in what used to be my father’s waiting room and turned around to see where she had gone. There she was, in my room, sitting on the floor on my mattress, twiddling her thumbs as she let out a big sigh.
“Well, Darian. Here we are.”
I walked towards her, hesitating a bit. Looking completely bored, Sophie asked in her seductive accent, “Have you figured anything out yet? Maybe it would be helpful if you actually tried kissing a woman. Maybe then, you would know.” On “know,” Sophie looked up at me, directly into my eyes; raising her eyebrows ever so slightly; communicating the perfect balance of desire and nonchalance. Holding her gaze steady, she continued to twiddle her thumbs.
“Well,” I said as I sat down next to her feeling slightly taken aback by her confidence, “it seems like you’re turning all the girls over in this town, so I figured I’d make you wait a bit for me, you know?” It was true; there were rumors that she had slept with nearly every “straight” girl in our circle of friends. I raised my eyebrows back at her, and then gave her a little smile. Sophie slid her hand across my leg and rested it inside of mine. A moment later, our fingers were intertwined in that little dance two young people will engage in when working their way up to their first kiss. Then our eyes locked.
“You’re going to marry Ethan Jones, aren’t you?” Sophie asked quietly, her eyes softening into a more vulnerable expression. “I’m going to start calling you Mrs. Jones,” she added.
“Now that’s just silly. Darian Jones is a ridiculous name,” I whispered. I felt myself beginning to melt into her space. I studied her lips. I loved her Italian accent, the way her mouth moved as she spoke. I placed my hands on her face and began to kiss her gently on the lips. It struck me how soft and small her mouth felt compared to Ethan’s, or any guy I had ever kissed. Slowly, the kisses became deeper and more passionate until I was finally lost in the greatest kiss I had ever experienced. It was years’ worth of need and knowing finding its way.
Sophie left early the next morning. I grabbed her coat and walked her to the front door of the church. The sky was still dark with secrets and anticipation. I embraced her outside and we began to kiss again. Long, deep kisses. As drivers passed by, I could feel their cars slow down, as they approached the scene we were apparently creating on the church steps. A group of college guys started yelling at us from their car as they drove by, so I gave them the middle finger as I continued to kiss Sophie goodbye. I suppose you don’t see two women making out on the steps of a church too often, but to me that church had been far stripped of any association with God or sanctity. The church was merely my home, and Sophie merely the person that I loved. We reluctantly pulled away from each other and I watched as Sophie got into her car and drove off. I walked back into the church, closing the front doors behind me. The large, oak doors suddenly felt light and careless. I walked into my room and began to write.
"Alteration Within" It was during those times when plans for her solar incandescence were to be kept a secret that moments seemed to advance by imperceptible degrees Not letting on to whom she would allow to radiate her fire Neither sun nor moon were visible though her dim light was enough to realize something new was approaching We embraced for a time behind the open door I knew as I watched her walk away that I would be left alone to witness changes in surroundings which would not unfold Sitting on cool, stone steps Eyeing beyond a piercing steeple I straightened my back to rid of the chill as I felt it cut into her consistence with aggression Still, she would not yield Her sky, absorbing all she felt, remained that of an unchanging medium Simply waiting for me to find the alteration within When it was finally found, I basked in her warmth as she watched her sky change to dawn without a word
The following semester, the day I told my parents that I was in love with Sophia, the three of us sat in that same, small, dark room. It was early in the morning and I had somehow managed to catch the flu. Sophie and I had gone to a party together the night before. Ethan had been acting out in anger since I had told him the news that Sophie and I were together and that I wasn’t interested in men any longer. He began showing up at the church uninvited, calling me and asking if we could just talk. One night, he drove to Sophie’s house and broke down her front door when she refused to answer it. Sophie called the police and Ethan was arrested. The police released him a few hours later and Ethan drove straight to the church where I was living to tell me what had happened.
Ethan began crying and explained how he had told the police that his girlfriend ended up being a “goddamn dyke,” which is when they chose to release him. Apparently, no man should be imprisoned who has suffered such torture. Potsdam was a small town and the police knew my family well as they had been involved with my dad’s malpractice case. The entire police department had been patients of my father’s back when he was still practicing medicine. I asked Ethan to leave. I felt sick and overwhelmed. I hated drama, yet my life seemed to be consumed by it. My parents couldn’t find out about me that way. I closed my eyes and wished for everything to disappear. I fell back to sleep. Later that morning, as I continued to sleep, I felt someone’s hand on my forehead.
“Honey? She has a fever,” my mother’s voice said.
“You were having a nightmare. Hello?” my father added.
“Your father and I just came by to pick up the mail. Why do you keep this door closed when you sleep? At least you get some light in here when you keep it open.”
My mother continued nagging at me, while opening the door leading to my father’s office.
“I was gonna call you,” I said as I propped myself up. “There’s actually something I need to talk to you both about.” My arms felt weak and my head was slightly spinning. Not feeling quite ready to tell my parents that I was gay, I decided to tell them about my nightmare instead. “I just dreamed that your house was trying to kill me and neither of you were doing anything to help me stay alive.”
“Oh, stop being so dramatic,” my mother said quickly, as if shooting me down had evolved into a mere reflex. Then she added, “What do you want to tell us?”
“You might want to sit down for this,” I replied.
“Where exactly do you expect us to sit in here? It’s not like there’s any room for chairs in this place,” she continued. “Why do you insist on living here? You should just come back home for God’s sake.”
My mother was being her difficult self and was doing a poor job at picking up on my cues. But in her defense, my father was out of work and had lost his license to practice medicine, and her daughter was about to tell her she was gay. But she didn’t know that last part yet, so things were about to get really awesome. My father, trying to be more accommodating, added “We can sit here on the mattress with you. What is it that you want to talk about?”
“I’m not sitting on the floor,” my mother interrupted. “Rooz, get me a chair from the other room.” My mom flipped her hair out of her face as she made her demands.
Then my parents and I sat…very uncomfortably. My dad and I sat on my mattress, while my mother positioned her chair in the small area of light that was just beginning to beam in through my dad’s former office. My throat was tight with pain. I could barely hear myself talk. The sun was beginning to rise and a dim light crept through the door, illuminating parts of my mother’s face as I spoke. As I struggled to find the appropriate words, my mother’s eyes remained shadowed and hidden while her mouth glistened in the sun as it reacted to my news. I told them about Sophie, how I had never felt this way about a boy before. I was in love, I was happy. Sophie had invited me to spend the summer with her at her parents’ vacation home in Lipari. I would get a job and try to save up the money to make that happen. My mother’s mouth tightened.
“What the hell is the matter with you? You’re beautiful, why the hell would you want to do something so disgusting? What, are you sick? Are you demented?” The lines surrounding my mother’s mouth deepened with every response. The interrogations went on for the next two hours as I sat, sick and crying, begging for their understanding and acceptance.
My parents began to argue. Whose fault was it? How did I turn out this way? What went wrong? My father, forever protective of me, never blamed me or showed any disdain towards me. In his eyes, it had all been my mother’s fault, her man-hating diatribes that had continued throughout my life. “Well, Pat, you have finally won,” he told my mother. “You have finally turned our daughter into a lesbian. I hope you are happy now.” And that’s when the shit really hit the fan; it had been the last straw for my mother. On top of the allegations against my father there was now this to deal with. It was simply too much for her. So my mother began to calmly explain how I was no longer her daughter. That it would be best if I moved out of town, and that I was never welcome in their house again. It even took my father aback.
Trying desperately to undo what he and I had apparently instigated, my father began to quickly soften his accusations towards her and turned to what he knew best – medicine. “We can fix this, Pat. It is probably something with her hormones,” he said. “We can take her to the hospital and I’ll run some tests. Yes, Pat, that is all this is. It’s nobody’s fault. I shouldn’t have said what I said.” My father began to stand up, but it was too late. My mother had already walked out in disgust, so my dad ran out after her. Time stood completely still for the next several hours, as I was left alone in shock to digest the fact that my mother had just disowned me.
Although I could only communicate with my mother through my father at this point, my parents agreed to allow me to remain in the church until I could transfer to another school the following semester. It would be over a year before my mother and I spoke comfortably with one another again. In the meantime, I told my father that I would not be getting any blood work done under any circumstances and that I didn’t want to talk about the matter ever again. The following semester, I transferred to Binghamton University, about four hours away from home, leaving Sophie, my parents, and love behind.
“I forgive you,” I said one last time to my ceiling, as tears streamed down my face. Then my cell phone finally rang again. I was disappointed when I saw that it was not my father calling with news. It was my aunt and uncle. I wasn’t expecting them to have any additional information regarding my mother. I imagined, in that moment, that my father would have called me first, but my Aunt Barb got straight to the point.
“Honey, your mom is dead. We just spoke to your father.”
“On, no!” I cried out, covering my mouth with my hand to muffle a sound that seemed to be building a life of its own. I didn’t want to wake the children. I didn’t want to cry, to feel so out of control. Yet, it was as if that howl was completely detached from me; a biological force so strong, that it could not be controlled or stopped. I felt my knees begin to buckle underneath and, out of nowhere, Jason was holding me steady as he helped me to my bed. He crawled in and lay next to me as I sobbed, now almost without sound, into my pillow. As the hours passed, I drifted in and out of sleep; reliving the news that she had died each time I woke. It was an excruciating six hours. Jason was there each time; placing his hand on my back, as my body silently raised and lowered with quick, rhythmic bouts of ever deepening grief.