Happy Birthday, Madelaine, My Old Friend
W
e made an unlikely pair. At the time, I was a twenty-something laid-back girl in army boots, and she was an almost 70-year-old, feisty, Irish lady with the whitest of hair and the airs of having money about her (though it was mostly gone by then). It was a union, brought on by necessity because she was house-bound and needed help with her groceries. As a favor to my boss, when the delivery guy was sick, I agreed to take her groceries up to the apartment. I'd heard of her nasty ways and I wasn't loving the idea. The first thing she said was call me Madelaine, with an "a." Being that she was an elder, I couldn't call her by her first name, and so we settled on Mrs. "O" - the "O" being for O'Hollaran. Sometimes, I think the "O" could've stood for overbearing. That always got a smile out of her.
I went over on my hour-long lunch break, and she offered me a cup of tea and biscuits. True to her ways, she started ordering me around as if I worked for her. She seemed quite surprised when I told her that I wasn't going to be pushed around because I wasn't her "girl" as she referred to Janet, who was her housekeeper. Everybody was her "girl." After that, there was a silence about her and her airs seemed less "pea cocky" as if I had ruffled her perfect feathers. But I think that day a friendship was borne.
I soon realized why she'd earned the reputation of the crusty, cantankerous, demanding and manipulative old bitty and had put off alot of people over the years. But I liked her sense of humor, which bordered on dirty, and I agreed to go back for a beer the following day. She drank beer and scotch and all the other good stuff she kept in her liquor cabinet in the hallway.
And so, the years passed on with me spending my lunches at her place, and, she trying to ply me with alcohol. We talked about this-and-that and her girlhood memories of dances at the Balmy Beach Club, which was just around the corner from where I now lived. I told her about my wild times at the Balmy Beach club parties, and we talked about the changes that had taken place in the neighborhood where she'd been all of her life.
On holidays, I would go over with a plate for her because she was without family and friends as she was alone in every sense of the word. We'd had a wonderful Canadian Thankgiving - one of the last few times I saw her. We ate in the common room at the nursing home and she told me how much she appreciated my friendship. I remember that day well.
We had an easy friendship. She said I made her laugh as if she were a school girl, and she gave me history as she talked about Toronto's beginning. She was also my sounding board in matters of the heart. It was a union brought on by necessity that had blossomed into genuine friendship and "kindred-spirit ship" that lasted close to 20 years. She was hardly the grandmotherly sort, and despite the 50 years plus age difference, we were true friends.
There was a silent understanding about the way she was and why she was the way she was. She talked about her unhappy beginning of being given away to a cruel adoptive family when she was old enough to remember, and she would always smile when she talked about her late husband Jerry who had been dead for over 20 years. She was proud that he was a handsome man who treated her well; the only person up to that point who had treated her well. Her eyes glistened whenever she talked about him, and I could see the young girl in her at that very moment. I was thankful that there was a slice of happiness within her somewhere.
There were some sad things about her...her possessions were her most prized things and she tried to buy people with them because she didn't know how to keep them around. I think she'd given away the same China cabinet to several people. She was always expecting me not to come back. I could feel it in her desperate hug whenever I was leaving as if she were silently pleading for me not to walk away. I told her that friends didn't walk away. I didn't know how to take it when she called me her best friend. I giggled every time she called me her "chocolate drop" while pinching my cheeks.
Just as I could see that gleam in her eyes whenever she talked about Jerry, I could always see how strongly she had faith in her religion as she spoke about her death. She spoke about her death often as if she were talking about going on a long vacation. I think that she was tired and ready to go home to be with Jerry. So I learned not to be afraid of death because she wasn't afraid of it...she had made peace with going home. She made me comfortable with her her dying as she would talk about the kind of send off she wanted. I think her only fear of dying was that no one would show up for the funeral.
Well, she passed on six years ago just before my Christmas visit to her in the nursing home, where we would get the strangest of looks as she had me rolling on the grass over some dirty joke Father Callahan had told her. And Madelaine, a lot of people did show up for your funeral. The Cathedral was packed and there were plenty of wet eyes and people got up and said nice things about you. So somebody did love you, Madelaine. I bet she was looking down and counting the number of people and blacklisting so-and-so because that was how she measured love - strange old bird she was.
Not a day goes by when I don't think of Mrs. "O." Whenever I look into the mirror (her almost 60-year-old antique mirror), I see her mischievous face smiling back at me. Gosh, she was a vain woman - always applying lipstick and eye-liner even though she couldn't see to do it. Today is her birthday - my fellow Libran - (maybe, that was why we understood each other so well). She would have been 88-years-old. And although I could never call her Madelaine in life - now years later, I feel comfortable enough to say, "Happy Birthday, Madelaine. Sleep well." The "O" now stands for Old Friend.
Copyright 2008 © Dawn Prince. Not to be reprinted without expressed permission.
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