A Quick Goodbye

Personal essay

Today I’d like to share something a bit different: a piece of personal writing in memory of my grandparents.

I originally wrote this piece in Spring 2019. At that point, my grandparents were in assisted living and had experienced significant physical and cognitive decline—though I would go on to see them several times before their ultimate passing, of covid, on April 10 and April 13, 2020. (You can read that story here.)

While I have tinkered with the language in places, this remains a true and relatively unedited account of the original events as I experienced them. I share it now on the two-year anniversary of my grandparents’ death.

A Quick Goodbye

I sit across from Bernie, ninety-four, and Evelyn, ninety-three. My grandparents. Only recently have I begun to refer to them in my head by their names, rather than their relationship to me. Names are more stable.

Bernie is soft and bulging, plopped in his wheelchair like dough. There is a wet spot on his upper thigh which, unprompted, he assures me is not urine. Evelyn is a little bird.

“Good to see you,” says Bernie.

“Good to see you, too,” I say.

“Nice, sunny day,” says Evelyn.

“Yes,” I say, though in fact it is quite cold outside.

“How’s school?” asks Bernie.

“Good,” I say. “I’m enjoying teaching.”

“You’re in New York City?” he asks.

“Yes, in Manhattan. On forty-seventh and eighth.”

“Forty-second?” says Evelyn.

“Forty-seventh,” I say.

“Forty-seventh?” says Evelyn.

“Yes.”

“What’s there?” says Bernie.

“I live there.”

“Oh,” says Evelyn. “That’s nice.”

“He’s teaching,” Bernie tells her. “In New York City.”

Evelyn is a skeleton wrapped in skin. Her bones poke out of her like a wire frame, a source of constant pain as they knock against each other or the hands of aides. Her eyes, deep in the blue bowl of their sockets, look proud and weepy.

“How’s the family?” she asks.

“They’re good,” I say. “Maj is in their second year at Oberlin.”

“A sophomore!” says Bernie. He is happy to know something.

“Yes,” I say. “At Oberlin.”

“That’s a good school,” he says. “It has a good reputation.”

“Yes, it does,” I say. “And Ari is about to graduate from the University of Wisconsin.”

“I was in Wisconsin for a summer,” says Evelyn. “It’s a very nice place.”

“We probably won’t make it to the graduation,” says Bernie.

“That’s okay,” I say. “It’s hard. I might not make it either.”

When Bernie and Evelyn die, I am aware that the real pain will be seeing the impact on my father. I am close with them only in the way that one feels close to a newborn baby, or to the author of a beloved book; we do not know each other as people. But my father remembers when they could crack jokes and make conversation. He remembers when they held the answers to all his questions—when they were giants who could pick him up and carry him to bed.

“I’m teaching a class on religion,” I say.

“What?” says Bernie.

“Religion,” I say. “I’m teaching a class on religion.”

Silence.

“I don’t understand what you’re saying,” says Bernie.

“Religion,” I say. “What do you think about religion? Are you religious?”

“No,” says Evelyn. “I never cared for it.”

“Why not?”

“Oh…” she says. This is a hard question for her—a why question.

“I forgot my reasons,” she finally says.

I nod. I’d expected as much.

“I guess I’m in the same boat,” says Bernie.

“Are you there?” asks Evelyn. “At the school with Ari?”

“Ye—Oh. No, I’m teaching. I teach high school.”

“What do you teach, English?” she asks.

“Yes,” I say. “Good memory.”

She looks older than she has ever looked, and suddenly I know, or think I know, that this is the last time I will see her. The knowledge surfaces without warning and spills out of my eyes without a sound. I don’t resist the tears; I reach out to hold their hands.

“What’s funny?” asks Evelyn. “Why are you laughing?”

For a moment, I can hear her old edge, the bite of judgment in her voice.

“I’m not laughing,” I say. “I just got emotional.” Except now I am laughing, because of her question, and the words come out choked. “I just got emotional,” I say again. “Because I love you.”

Bernie looks confused.

“Stand up!” says Evelyn. “That’s a job.”

I stop crying.

“The important thing is that you believe in what you do,” she says.

I nod earnestly, my eyes still wet with tears, and we sit in silence for a bit.

“How’s the family?” asks Evelyn.

* * *

When I say goodbye, my kisses are brisk, businesslike: “I love you,” peck, “I love you,” peck.

As I turn and walk away, I hear one of the aides remark how much I look like my father.