Forces

   As sometimes happens in life, as I mark the anniversary of the deaths of two significant people in my life, today I learned about two more deaths. From Facebook posts I read about Ann Sullivan’s death. She lived her whole life in Vergennes, the town where I grew up. She was born and raised there, and raised her own five kids there. She was a reading specialist and eventually became the vice principal at our high school, and she was great at her job. She knew the students, she knew their parents, and she likely knew their grandparents. No kid was going to pull anything over on Mrs. Sullivan. She had a no-nonsense way about her. She also played Pomp and Circumstance on the piano every year for high school graduation, and played the organ for likely hundreds of weddings and funerals at St. Peter’s Catholic Church. She officiated at weddings as a Justice of the Peace, and organized the annual Memorial Day parade in town. She never needed a microphone at a school assembly. She was a force of service and compassion.
   And a phone call today from a Lancaster, NH friend let me know about the death of Bob Fink, another remarkable person. When I worked at Hospice of the Lancaster Area, my office was in the Weeks Medical Center’s Home Health & Hospice building. Bob supervised the Home Health & Hospice staff, probably about 25 nurses and administrative people, all women. Not too many men, or women, could pull that off with the ease that Bob did. Patient care and the wellbeing of his staff were his priorities, above policies and procedures. He worked hard to support Democratic candidates in a very Red corner of a Red state, mentored many social workers, and built boats with his friend Pan. He was a force of goodwill and kindness.
   A few weeks ago was the first anniversary of my dad’s death. It’s one of those days that’s difficult to know what to do with. He was in the hospital in Burlington when he died. It was early on a Saturday morning. My twin sister, Ann, and I were headed back to the hospital to be with him as he would be transferred to the hospice house later that morning. He had agreed to go to the hospice house just the day before, but during the conversation with the hematology-oncologist, he had tried to make a deal - one of his favorite things to do. He said he would go to the hospice house, but not until Monday. He said he needed to go home for the weekend, and although he was 88 and frail, he said he needed to get back to his office to “get some things done,” and fully intended to. The doctor said he couldn’t safely allow Dad to go home. This may have been the first time in nearly two years of caring for my dad that the doctor did not allow my dad to make the decision for the next step in his plan of care. We said our goodbyes and told him we’d be there first thing in the morning before he was transferred to the hospice house. He, or his body, decided there would be no going the hospice house and he died before it was light out, before we left for Burlington. My dad was a complicated force in my life, that came with a lesson about how people often struggle to do their best.
   In a few days it will also be the first anniversary of the death of my childhood friend’s dad. For more than 50 years, Dr. Bicknell provided care to an entire community. He was as beloved as a man can be, and cherished by the community that he was devoted to. He and my dad were childhood friends, growing up in Richford together where Dr. Bicknell’s dad was the teaching principal of their small high school. Life led the two friends to Vergennes where they raised their families and where their kids became friends. Dr. Bicknell was, for me, a force of caring and love.
  Those are my four right now. It’s likely that you have your own four that you’re thinking of these days; these people that we remember and honor, and hold close to our hearts. They remain forces in our lives. In my weekly poetry-conversation phone call with my friend Anne, in Damariscotta, Maine (not Portland as I mistakenly wrote in a previous column) we recently talked about a poem, “Flare,” by Mary Oliver. In part it reads: “Scatter the flowers over the graves, and walk away. Be good natured and untidy in your exuberance.” I love the idea of living on, moving ahead, with “untidy exuberance,” but the walking away part is most difficult. Perhaps we can do it, knowing that we are supported by the forces, their forces of service, love, compassion and trying one’s best.