Goodbye Sun: Loss Reflection (Repost)

Follow the link to read a tribute to my mother Susan Pittmann for her October 31st birthday.

Dear Mom,

Thank you for all that I am. I hope that you are proud of me. 

I will always love you. 

Cynthia

LEARNING TO TRUST

Reflection on Trust During Troubled Times

David: Why do people do such terrible things?
Sophie: Like what?
David: Like beat people, and kill them, and make them prisoners.
Sophie: Most people don’t do that, David.
David: My friend Johannes always used to tell me, "Trust no one."
Sophie: Oh, life wouldn’t be worth living if you did that, David. You can be cautious, but you have to let people in.
David: How do you know if they’re bad or not?
Sophie: David, most people are good. They have families and friends, and they just want to live their lives as happily as they can. Oh there will always be bad people in this world and you will usually know them when you meet them, but sometimes you won’t. But you can’t let that stop you from living your life fully and freely. And making friends and seeing the goodness in people because if you can’t do that you will never find any happiness.

I am David (film)

Do you ever wonder how you can trust again after a difficult experience? I admit that I struggle with this one. Sometimes I think I'm a bit like the 12 year old David in the quote above. He was taken by himself to a Bulgarian concentration camp when he was young because of his family's political beliefs. Growing up away from his family in a lackluster environment surrounded by guards who are quick to administer punishment changes the way he interacts with people. He forgets how to smile. When unexpectedly he is given a chance to escape, he sets off on a journey across Europe to Denmark carrying important secret papers which later turn out to be his personal identification and the information needed to reunite him with his mother.

The story is compelling, but it is his interaction with Sophie, the Swiss woman who helps him to get in touch with his mother that is the most moving. She is played by Joan Plowright, a favorite English actress who plays a similar role, Mary who takes care of Luca Innocenti, in Tea with Mussolini. Both Sophie and Mary are exactly the kind of people I admire. In both of these roles, we meet creative, self-sufficient yet engaged with others woman; these women are not afraid to reach out when help is needed. Admittedly, I like Joan Plowright best in Enchanted April, where she plays Mrs. Fisher, a woman whose feelings have contracted so much that she has lost the ability to feel compassion for others, but then her time in Italy thaws the her heart and she realizes the importance of yielding to creative impulses and allowing connection with others. (photos from Facebook fan page)

Why am I pulled toward this type of character? I think I have to continually learn the trust lesson. I imagine myself sitting down and discussing life over a cup of Earl Grey tea with a wise woman like Sophie. If I let my imagination go further, I can envision that I might be a woman like Sophie in the future...and maybe a little now. However, at the moment, I'm feeling more like David-cut off and fighting with my own emotional demons- I'm particularly battling with trust issues.

Perhaps you know that my own mother was murdered by a neighbor. (I have told the story before-just click the link.) I don't know if you realize how perplexing it is to that young person who resides inside me -ever an innocenti- she who cannot comprehend how someone familiar and well-known-a lifelong neighbor- could do something so cruel.

You read about people- this past weekend in Puerto Rico, for example- who kill their own spouse or family, and then turn the gun back on themselves. It seems like such a foreign experience. You never think you will have to confront that type of situation with anyone you personally know.

I have never been able to connect the act of murder with the known person who was my neighbor.

Factually, I know he did it. I've looked at him in photographs and in court but it never made sense to me. I think about his behavior more as a symptom of society's sickness and lack of tolerance for difference. I have to make myself remember that it was his hand that pulled the trigger.

It was Jim Brooks who killed my mother and her partner, Christine.

No, even after writing that statement, it still feels remote.

While viewing I am David, I allow myself to feel upset. After the movie, I watch an episode of Friends and found it extremely amusing. I laughed out loud. I felt freer somehow and more open to all emotions. I know it is important to feel. I also know that trying not to feel leads to depression. Did you know that when you have trouble, it often acts like a trigger for a cluster of repressed feelings, and there are some things that you just don't want to remember. Noticing myself going through this emotional roller coaster made me realize that I need to remember to feel and allow myself to trust people again.

Sophie is right:

 "...there will always be bad people in this world and you will usually know them when you meet them, but sometimes you won’t. But you can’t let that stop you from living your life fully and freely. And making friends and seeing the goodness in people because if you can’t do that you will never find any happiness." 

I'll take that wise woman's advice!

(Note: OWL)

A Visit to the Blue Hole

I haven't seen my brother in 20 years. 

In the wake of Mom's unexpected death, he moved to the mountains in Tennessee and I moved to the island of Puerto Rico. It's common to look for peace and new surroundings when tragedy suddenly strikes. Nevertheless, the closeness you feel as siblings never goes away. It's so good to reconnect with my brother Richard!

We walked to the Blue Hole and I couldn't resist going in! Soon I convinced him to come in too! 

It's not so cold!! (I lied!) he looked at me in the water and decided to show me how it's done.

"Are you going to jump!? I exclaim. He tells me, "That's the only way." 

Sibling rivalry? He wins - hands down! 

Now Patrick the General decides it's time to join the party! It's his first swim ever!! 

Poor baby! The water is so cold! Better get him out, now! 

Life can be so hard. We have to make the most of the good times. 

Jump right in and live!! 

Dear Mom

For Susan Pittmann who died a violent death by an angry and bitter man on this day 22 years ago:

Dear Mom,

I like to think of you as happy with all of your children and grandchildren nearby. 

You must know that you indeed have lived a successful life - though brief, you made every day meaningful! 

You taught me how to love unconditionally and focus on the good in people. 

Your memory is a great comfort to me.

I celebrate your life more and more every day! 

Your loving daughter, 

Cynthia ❤️

"To laugh often and much; 

To win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children;

To earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends;

To appreciate beauty, to find the best in others;

To leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition;

To know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived.

This is to have succeeded."

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803 - 1882)

Goodbye Sun

Today, October 31st, is my mother, Susan G. Pittmann's birthday. She has been gone now for 16 years and 5 months, and I miss her dearly. She enjoyed the fact that she was born on "the Witches" day-and this blog- Oasis Writing Link(OWL)-is named in honor and memory of her. Mom was killed by her neighbor, James Elwood Brooks...why? Brooks was deeply offended by the public display of affection between Mom and Christine Puckett. Some say there was a property line dispute over the construction of a privacy fence but why did they need to build a fence? This question points to the truth, Mom and Christine were killed because they were lesbian lovers who were bold enough to get married and kiss in public, i.e. in the front yard within full view of all the neighbors and the passing cars on Middlebelt Road!

Brooks was not a stranger to me, our family knew him for years. He used to drink too much but he quit; he was angry and lonely. Frequently, he was lonely more than angry and I felt sorry for him. Once he shot our pet chicken, Chicken Little, because she was trespassing on his property. I was not afraid of him, though; I just thought that he had a temper as we used to say in Michigan. As a child, I reflected, I had a temper, too. Once I ran to his house when Black Beauty, our Labrador retriever, was locked in the backseat of our car. She must have gotten in when we opened the doors to go into the house. I remember I had a feeling that she entered while I was taking my time getting out of the car. It was that feeling that led me to discover where she was...I desperately tried to call Mom and Dad who were at work but there was no way to contact either of them. Brooks said the only way to open the door was by breaking a window, I tried but I couldn't. He said that the dog looked dead anyway. His lack of action was disheartening. Black Beauty, a gorgeous reject from a seeing eye dog school, died from the intense heat and lack of air. I saw her rolled up in a comfortable circle on the floor just waiting for her next car ride. (I know that sounds like a sad country song.)

Brooks occasionally threatened to shoot Cin-Cin, my French alpine 4H show goat, especially when she slipped out of the corral to contentedly enjoy the fresh green leaves off of his young apple trees. He threatened to shoot often but usually, he controlled himself by calling the police or reporting us for some imagined (or real) minor infraction. Ironically, he was reporting Mom and Christine for animal abuse. He shot at Mom's dogs, Arrow and Ms. Pitt, for trespassing. Ms. Pitt -yes, she was a pittbull-had a thyroid condition that slowed her down; she was heavy and not much of a wanderer so Mom kept her inside of the house most of the time. Brooks was shooting at Arrow and reporting Mom to any authority he could think of while passing more and more time at the Orchard Grove restaurant and bar. Shocked neighbors encouraged his rage at the lesbian women over at the Pittmann place. I imagine them questioning, "What happened to Sue, anyway? Wasn't she married to Richard all those years?" They would try to reason, "I always knew there was something weird about her; she rode a big motorcycle, you know. I heard she went all the way to Alaska on her bike; she's such a showoff." The grapevine reports that Brooks shared his plans to kill Mom and Christine down at the Grove where he would receive ongoing sympathy and support for his distressing viewing situation. He was going to kill them; he told the neighbors. He was going to kill them; he told Mom and Christine.

Brooks was not always a man of his word; he had a record of temper, not commitment. In the kitchen where he would sit and drink coffee, he had a gun-a hunting rifle-behind him. He had a couple of rifles in the corner and a shotgun as well. I imagine him sitting there at the table, rage pouring over his skin while he thought,"It's not natural ...those women together like that; it's just not right." Decisively, he got up and went to the property line; he crossed it and confronted Christine who was working on the fence posts.

Mom told me that Christine had a camera and was trying to take his picture while he was on their property; maybe she did snap a picture. Who knows? Brooks and Christine exchanged words and he went back to his house, pointed a rifle from the kitchen doorway and at a distance, shot Christine. Mom was calling 911 when Christine was shot. I heard the recording, "He shot my worker!" she said. The police operator tried to get details; address, descriptions-anything to keep Mom on the phone. I heard a sound like a phone falling to the ground and that was all. Mom ran out to help Christine who was face down in the grass. Brooks walked to our circle drive with his shotgun. With the strength of metal and gun powder, he faced my mom. She looked directly at him, courageously stood in front of him, while he lifted the gun and shot into her. She was so close to him that the bullets made a dollar-sized hole in her body; the blood poured out quickly and she was gone.

Sometime during the event, probably after Brooks killed Mom, he walked up to Christine and shot her directly in the back. Then he got into his car, backed up, and sat there waiting for the police to come. When they approached him, he didn't try to escape, he just said, "It had to be done." It had to be done. When you shoot wounded animals; a horse with a broken leg, a dog hit by a car, or a litter of puppies infested with maggots; you might say, it has to be done. When you kill two women who loved each other; and you are James Elwood Brooks or the community that supported him, you say; it had to be done.

Mom was 55 years old and Christine was 36, I think. I know it was May 5, 1992, Cinco de Mayo in southern California, when I heard the news. My sister, Linda, called me at work- the US Department of Defense, Naval Consolidated Brig, Miramar, and said, "Mom is dead." I replied, "Mom is dead? How do you know? Tell me, are you sure?" Someone called her, a cousin, I think, and said your mom's been shot. I couldn't believe it. I wouldn't believe it. I was going to see her soon. I had my airline ticket and her new baby granddaughter, Amber, too; we were going to be there. She's not dead, I thought. But she was...her body was gone and I was too shaken to feel her in any other way.

Sue Pittmann was powerful. Her presence cleared the space of doubt around me and made me sure I could do anything. I am so proud to be her daughter. When the sun set on her life; it set in my heart and I knew I had to be strong on my own; I had to go on without a powerful mother lighting the way for me. I think I'm fine. Today's Mom's birthday; how glad I am that she was born. Happy Birthday Mom and thank you for my life.