Lifetime Mysteries

After a life not so kind, mostly brought on

by a deep depression of the mind, and having

to deal with three sons birthed one after one,

my mother died at age fifty-nine. (Adding to

her melancholia, The Great Depression and

World War Two turned out to be a few more

bitter bites for her to chew.) My father, her

knight in shinning armor at first, proved to be

a lot less stellar than she expected him to be.

This story has been re-told over and over again

in the post-war dreamworld of our society—

white picket-fenced houses in the suburbs, and

new cars parked in every garage. Leave it to

Beaver family lives being lived from sea-to-

shining-sea. I got to thinking about my own life,

befuddling and conflicted at times with that

insidious strain of depression my mother and

father passed along to me genetically. Today,

I am seventy-years of age, and my two brothers

are seventy-one and sixty nine respectively.

Were she alive today, our mother would be some-

where in the neighborhood of ninety-three. I am

sure she would be questioning how it is that her

three sons have thus far managed to survive. In

reality, it is I who has been doing that wondering

on her behalf. For several decades now, mother

has been far beyond questioning one of those

venial varieties of lifetime mysteries. At my age
and in my lifetime there is no end to the wondering.

Chris Hanch 11-10-17