John Lennon Saved My Life

Okay, so this is a flash-forward. This segement is going to be when I was in college...This is the defining moment when I sort of embraced the negative feelings I had been denying myself. If anything is confusing, let me know.

When the grief group had finished for the evening I trudged up the stairs to my dorm room on the second floor of Snowbarger. It was Tuesday night, which also meant that it was open dorms for the guys. I did my best to sidle past each room as inconspicuously as possible. I wasn’t popular by any stretch of the imagination so the chances of someone talking to me seemed a little far-fetched, but I did it anyway. Just in case.

Reaching my doorway, I wondered how much the group was really helping. Each meeting left me emotionally drained and angrier with my mother. Tonight, we discussed what it must have felt like for me to come down the stairs each morning, unsure if my mother would be there sleeping on the couch.

Sighing, I dug a hand into the dark recesses of my jean pockets and pulled out my key ring. The key jiggled in my hand and the lock slid open. A peculiar feeling gripped my mind during the meeting and I couldn’t shake it. I felt like the corners of my brain were peeling back and something wanted to burst out. “Calm down,” I told myself. I’d grown accustomed to bottling my anger over the years, but my inner demons were growing restless. Tired of being suppressed and denied. My rage bubbled and boiled higher, rising into my chest. My knuckles clenched until I finally felt the long, sticky fingers of bitterness clutch my mind.

“What good will it do to get mad at her?” My rational side said. “She’s dead. Move on with your life.”

I shuffled through a stack of lecture notes piled on my desk and pulled a John Lennon CD from underneath. I slammed the disk in to my stereo. I jabbed the random button and jumped on to my bed.

Listening to Lennon’s music was like participating in his therapy sessions. There was an unexplainable bond that I felt to his lyrics. He understood what I was going through. When Lennon was 17, a drunken policeman who was off-duty hit John’s mother with his car and killed her. After he was informed of the accident, Lennon had to go the morgue to identity her body.
The first song that belted through the speakers in Lennon’s raw voice was a piece he wrote in memory of his mother.

Mother, You had me I never had you
I wanted you but you didn't want me
So I got to tell you
Goodbye, Goodbye

Images raced through my mind as I thought of my mother. I clutched her tightly around the waist the night she left—The day we helped her move across town into her dingy apartment; it was my birthday—The afternoon we found all the bills hidden throughout the house—Watching her leave, zipped up tightly in her body bag—The casket sinking into the ground. Tears fell from my face as the song continued.

Father, You left me but I never left you
I needed you but you didn't need me
So I just got to tell you
Goodbye, Goodbye

The night he screamed at me in the kitchen—His tears rippling the still waters of Lake Como as he tried to figure out what he did wrong—The question he probably asked himself all the time: “Why didn’t she love me?”

Lennon’s voice broke into a frenzied pitch.

Momma don’t go! Daddy come home.
Momma don’t go! Daddy come home.
Momma don’t gooooOOOO!
Momma don’t gooooOOOO!

Memories flooded me…
“Karen talk to me!” my dad shouted.
“Why do you have to go?” I asked her the night she left.
“She’s been diagnosed with cancer. She has two weeks to live.”
“Your dad found bills hidden around the house,” Kristina whispered nervously. “It looks like she was having another affair.”
“Sometimes I wish this was all a bad dream,” I whispered to my father in his darkened room. “I’m just waiting to wake up.”

“Aahhh!” I shouted, jumping from my bed. My feet ran to my desk, my hands jerked a desk drawer open and pulled out my journal.

My anger burst through the surface. The pen scribbled furiously on the notebook. My hand moved automatically, writing the words as if copying them from the dark recesses of my mind.

Mommy you’re dead. It’s so hard to explain.
All my life you’ve caused me such pain
‘Cuz you didn’t want a family man,
You didn’t want me too.
Broke my heart, ‘cuz all I ever wanted was you.

A giant tear splashed onto the paper, smearing the black ink. I cried in angst to her memory, holding my head in my hands. “Why mom? Why did you have to do this to us? Why did you have to leave me?” I sniffed, wiping my nose with the back of my hand, and continued writing.

Well now since you’ve been gone
Thoughts run through my head
Since you’ve left me the very last time
Since you’ve been dead.

Laughter echoed in the hallway as I looked at my locked door. I wished I could have had a life like theirs. “But, no!” I thought. “You had to muck it up with your stupid mistakes!

Well I hate you. I love you;
I just want to see,
Free of doubt and free of fear
What’s a family?

We weren’t good enough for you!” my pen paused. “You said you loved me,” I sobbed. “You’re a liar.”

Now you are dead and buried in the ground
And I wonder if there’s hope to be found
And I wonder if you’ve love me at all
And if you did then why weren’t you in it for the long haul

Six feet in the ground, now there’s no hope to be found
Six feet in the ground, now there’s no hope to be found

Well now since you’ve been gone
Thoughts run through my head
Since you’ve left me the very last time
Since you’ve been dead.

Well I hate you and I love you
I just want to see,
Free of doubt and free of fear
What’s a family?

“Momma don’t go! Daddy come home.” Lennon’s song ended and the room was quiet. My trembling hands dropped the pen as I looked at my words. The temptation seized me to rip up the piece of paper and deny those feelings, but I didn’t.

I walked to the stereo and shut the music off, threw myself on my bed, and cried myself to sleep.