Monday morning, 8:38am.
I woke up today with a similar feeling that a typical Monday offers. Long weekend escape off from work only to be welcomed back to 5 days on. The reluctantness of climbing out of bed because the chill in the room made the covers weigh about 200 pounds. The feeling of a work-free hangover. Hesitant to put that first heavy step on the floor because you know that will set off a chain reaction of events that will lead you to your desk. But today is different. I’m not going into work but on the agenda is something that is equally challenging to me but in different ways. So I reached for my phone to check on the babies through their wifi cams as I do every morning. All still asleep and almost 7am. That made me happy that they are letting mom sleep. She needs it. I heaved the heavy covers off from my body. Put my right foot on the ground. Stood up as slow and wobbly as a toddler standing for the first time. With the stretch of my back and the morning cracks of my joints I got my day started. Shower…Pack…Coffee… Breakfast. Then off to say my final good-byes.
The last time I was in Indiana was the last day I lived here. My three brothers and I jumped in the camper shell covered bed of my uncle’s pick-up truck and drove across the country to Santa Barbara, California where we all eventually seperated. Before we left Indiana for good, however, we stopped to pay our respects to our mom. I remember walking across the cemetery lawn looking for her plot. I was old enough to realize the levity of the situation but young enough to be naïve to the future implications. I knew this was a “sucky” event in my life but couldn’t grasp the serious impact it would have on every aspect of my future self. Friendships. Relationships. Self worth. Inner strength. Drive. Self-consciousness. Confidence. I didn’t realize that every step I took outside of that cemetery lawn would now be 100 times more challenging then before. Every step that I took will now be alone.
We found her plot and you could see the freshly tilled ground slightly raised with a small wooden nameplate marking her grave with her first initial and last name – M. Robinson.
I’m still bothered that whomever chose the name for her name plate, chose to give her her husband’s last name – David Robinson. He was a terrible husband and even worse father. He is technically only Chad’s father but was never around so not sure Chad would even consider him his dad. Not even sure my mom would have considered him her husband. After he brought his mistress to her funeral and abandoned us in an orphanage our whole family disowned him. Needless to say, I plan on changing that name on the marker one day.
In the back of the truck heading to the cemetery I had a notebook and a pencil. I loved to draw as a kid but wasn’t that talented. My mom was a brilliant artist and my older brother inherited those talents. I remember she once painted this underwater adventure featuring Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck and the entire gang on the walls surrounding the bathtub. The details were perfectly exact and it looked as if the characters were really alive on an underwater journey to find hidden treasure. But watch out for that shark over there!!! I remember being so excited to take a bath so that I too could go on that journey with Mickey. But, sadly, I never had the chance to. She was about half way through her masterpiece when her life was cut short. That is one thing that still haunts me – walking into that bathroom the day we were evicted knowing that that Disney mural will never be completed.
In my note pad I scribbled down four notes; one for each of us boys. The notes read:
I love you mom.
-Chris
I love you mom.
-Michael
I love you mom.
-Chad
I love you mom.
-Josh
When we climbed out of the back of my uncle’s truck, I handed each of my brothers their notes along with some twigs I found on the ground. They weren’t too sure what to do with them until they saw me walk up to her grave, bend down to my knees and pin the note to the ground above her with the twig. They followed suit. We stood there awhile and I don’t recall what was said or who cried but all I remember was walking away and looking back as we were driving off and seeing the four notes stuck to the ground, slightly rustling in the breeze. That image will forever be burned into my memory.
I decided to go to a local diner near the cemetery for breakfast. It was called “The Girls Diner” and in concordance to the name, the front of the house was ran by all girls. They were all friendly and greeted me with terms of endearment like “hun” and “sweetie.” Everyone that walked in was greeted by his or her names followed up by, “what can I getcha to drink hun?” It felt like a small town diner. It was nice. I ordered Biscuits and Gravy and enjoyed eaves dropping on others conversations. Nothing juicy to report out of Seymour Indiana but a nice break from my reality. When I finished I asked if there was a local florist. Two of the gals started naming all the flower shops nearby, telling me which streets they are on and how far away they were or which stores they were near. This grew into tangents about which one they used for different events. Who has the best roses or sunflowers. Why Jade would never visit the one on State again because the flowers she got her mom for mother’s day wilted in less than a week. After some time I asked which was the closest and they told me of one right down the street. “Go to the sign and turn left, you can’t miss it. You’ll see a big greenhouse.” “You can’t miss it” Jade chimed in. I thanked them and headed out.
They were right about the greenhouse and not missing it. The flower shop was only about 5 blocks away. Inside I ordered a nice bouquet of flowers that sat in a small cup with a spike that sticks into the ground about 5 inches. They were Christmas themed and had pine branches mixed in with pinecones and red and white flowers. They smelled amazing. They smelled of Christmas. Mom loved Christmas. (Maybe that’s who I get it from. But then again, who doesn’t love Christmas?) After about 15 minutes they finished the arrangement and I was on my way. The cemetery was only about 8 blocks down the street so the drive was very short. Which is good so I didn’t have too much time to let my thoughts wonder.
Then, there it was. A sign that read “Riverview Cemetery” hugged the corner of 16th street. I turned left into the cemetery and drove to the right. I had a feeling she was buried that way. I noted the location in my phone from when I found it on the site I was researching a few months earlier, section J - plot 120, so I thought it would be easy to find her. Plus I remembered it was by a tree. (Side note, there were hundreds of trees) I wish I could say that I was led to her grave by natural instincts but I wasn’t. I was lost. I circled that graveyard 4 times looking for section J. I found sections A, C, I, and two section Ns but no J. In fact there were a ton of missing section signs which made finding the location impossible. Nobody seemed to be around to ask either for help either. So I went back to section I thinking that it HAD to logically be around there. I got out and looked around, searching for her nameplate but found nothing. I noticed that I started asking the names I saw on the grave stones I passed if they have seen my mom but none of them answered. Some of them were even there for over a hundred years. Guess they don’t talk that much.
I was starting to get cold so I decided to go look for someone to ask. I came across someone prepping a grave for burial. I asked him if he could direct me to section J but he had no idea. He politely directed me towards some grounds keepers working on the far end of the cemetery who should know exactly where it was. So I drove across the cemetery where I came across three younger guys all wearing overalls and warm worker clothes. I rolled down my window and asked them where section J was located. “Up front near the highway” one called out. The other must have seen my confused look on my face so he said, “Next to section I.” (Gee thanks).
“Yeah, I was just up there and there were no signs at all for a section J. Is it right next to section I?
“Yes” they confirmed confidently. Inspired, I drove back over to section I. By now it’s been about 20 minutes and I was getting cold and a little frustrated. Who made this cemetery? Who was in charge of these signs? Who designed the layout of this place?
Shhhhhh.
I reminded myself why I was here in the first place and silenced the negativity. I was in no hurry so I didn’t need to feel rushed or frustrated. So I went back to section I and parked, got out and searched around for a nameplate with Marilyn Robinson on it. I’ve only seen the image of the nameplate online so I had an idea of what it looked like so I knew it wasn’t a tall one, eliminating about half of the stones. I went up and down the section twice and still couldn’t find my mom. And none of the residents were much help either.
So I drove back to the “oh so helpful” groundkeepers and asked them again.
“Man I’m lost. I found section I, parked there and looked past that area and couldn’t find anything. Could you maybe help me out a little?”
“Ah you went past I? No its before section I” the red bearded keeper said.
“So section 'I' comes BEFORE section J?” I asked.
“Yes sir” as if that was as normal as 3 coming after 2.
“Okay, thanks.”
I drove back to the section before section I and parked the car off to the side. I was confident so I grabbed the flowers and proceeded to walk up and down this new section in search for my mom. I walked up and down the entire section two times with no luck. “Am I at the right place?” I thought to myself. It did look familiar but none of the stones matched. And how reliable is my memory from 28 years ago? Well it got me this far so must be pretty reliable. With that I kept looking as a truck pulled up and parked behind my car.
“Can I help you find something sir?” the main keeper, Frank, called out as he was stepping our of his truck with a huge scroll of paper in his right hand. He could clearly see I was lost. He unrolled the scroll a little and asked for the name that I was looking for.
“Robinson” I told him. “Supposed to be in Section J, plot 120.”
He ran his finger down the list reading the names and looking at the stones then took a few steps from where I was parked and said, here she is.
At first I looked down and only saw a huge stone that read “Robert Douglas.” When I was about to tell him that that wasn’t it I looked behind it and saw a small metal plate that was about 8 inches by 6 inches which read in tiny letters “Marilyn Robinson, 1957-1988.” It was hidden behind Robert’s stone. “Dang it Robert, why didn’t you say anything when I asked before?” I thought to myself.
“Wow that is pretty small” I said allowed.
Frank took that as in invitation and proceeded to talk to me about upgrading the grave stone and what that entailed. “Well we will need to lay a foundation plate that runs about $120 per foot and we are looking at up to 4 feet.” He continued on trying to give me information about local places that I could purchase stones from accompanied with the location and directions but he could see that I wasn’t really listening. The moment I saw her name I froze and couldn’t take my eyes from those 15 tiny little letters. I think he got the hint and stopped talking then wished me luck and shook my hand. I thanked him for his help as he walked away towards his truck.
There she was. There is my mom. After 28 years we are finally reunited. After the initial shock wore off, my eyes started investigating her plot. I couldn’t get the size of her nameplate and the name on it, out of my mind. I tried talking to her but every time I looked at her nameplate I saw Robert staring back at me; distracting me from my train of thoughts. It was literally touching Robert’s big stone and you couldn’t even see it from the front. So I looked around to make sure Frank was gone, bent down and yanked her plate out of the ground. The two-foot metal spike unearthed a lot of dirt that must have not been disturbed in years, as it was hard to pull up. I then proceeded to plant the plate back in the ground near the head of her plot where it would stand out on its own; undistracted. (I even left it about 8 inches off the ground so it would be a little taller than her neighbor’s - Hilda.)
After I was happy with the height, the balance and level, I placed the flowers down and had a seat next to her making sure her plate was as clean as it could be. Then I introduced her to my wife and children. I showed her some photos of Adriana and the babies. Then I played her a video that Adriana sent me of the boys laughing and playing in the bathtub just a few nights prior. Jordan and Jaycee pulled the basket off of the rod I installed to hold their toys and one was throwing toys in the basket while the other was dumping them out and they found this utterly amusing. They were laughing so hard that Jordan nearly stopped breathing. This went on for nearly two minutes and it was so infectious that you couldn’t help but to laugh along with them. I played this video for my mom and I imagined her smiling along with me.
When the video was over I shared a few private moments with her and told her a few things that I needed to. I told her that I forgive her for leaving even though it wasn’t her fault. I asked for forgiveness for harboring anger towards her for so many years for leaving me when I needed her most. I told her about my life. Some of the accomplishments I had done and some of my future goals. Told her about high school and Penn and the Janowiczs and how wonderfully they took care of me. I told her how my brothers are doing. Well as much as I know about them. Told her about her brothers and how we had to say good-bye to her mom a few years ago. But she already knew that. I apologized for taking 28 years to come see her and told her that I’ll be sure not to wait that long for my next return. And next time I’ll bring my family so she could meet them in person. I told her that I hoped she was proud of me and hoped I did right by her and wished she had a chance to hold her grand babies…
With that I headed back to my car to head back to the airport. As I was putting my things away I looked in my bag and saw my notebook. I pulled it out and wrote a little note on a page, ripped the note out, walked back to my mom’s grave and stuck the note to the ground with some twigs I found on the ground. I told her I loved her and missed her one last time, asked Hilda, Robert, Franklin and Mabel to take good care of her and went back to my car.
As I got in my car I heard a school bell ring followed by a bunch of kids flooding out of the elementary school directly across the street from my mom. I looked back at her location and thought that it was perfect. She was near the road so easy to get to. Under a huge tree so lots of shade in the summer time and right near an elementary school so she will always be greeted by children’s laughter. And now that I made all the introductions, she was surrounded by new friends. The thought of that made me feel a lot better. I put the airport address into my phone, the car into drive and drove off.
Everyone has had challenging events in their lives that require some sort of journey of their own to assist in healing. They could be major events or simple ones. But no one is unique in the sense of suffering. Suffering makes you stronger. Crying makes you stronger. Feeling makes you stronger. I was fortunate enough to adopt an outlook on life at an early age that allowed me to never believe in mistakes. Everything happens for a reason and you just need to be open enough to figure out that reason. If my mom never passed I would have never moved around as much as I did and met as many people as I did that made me as outgoing as I am now. If my mom never passed I would have never moved back to California and played youth football where I met Matt who’s family later let me move in with them. I would have never attended Arroyo Grande High School where I met Andy whom pushed me to try pole-vaulting that led me to getting recruited by Penn in which I attended. I would have never went on to New York after graduating where I got into fit modeling which I continued to do in LA which introduced me to Deepak whom hired me at Roar in which I attended a fashion show where I met my future wife. If my mom never passed I would have never had my amazing triplets (facebook.com/ColemanTriplets2015) which introduced me to JR whom, through a conversation, made me realize that I needed to stop being a son and start being a father. Which led me to buying a ticket and flying to Indiana to say goodbye to my mom. It’s so easy to roll over and give up once life trips you and knocks you on your butt. But getting up, analyzing why you were tripped and what strengths you were lacking that allowed you to fall in the first place and then proceeding to kick life’s ass…. That true strength.
Yes I harbored guilt and still do in a way but now I feel I’m in a comfortable place to where I can work on that. I was close to giving up three different times in my life. I had a lot of self-doubt and low self worth. But I also knew my strengths as well as my weaknesses and pushed on and I fought like hell to strengthen those weaknesses. This weekend was a very long, emotional weekend. I cried, I laughed, I reflected and I lived. I learned a lot about who I am, who I was and who I want to be. This journey was long over due and I am happy that I finally took it but thrilled that it is coming to a close. As I’m on this flight heading back to California I am so excited to hug my wife and my babies and just be around loved ones and experience joy.
Has the world changed around me? Will everything be like a movie with a perfect feel good ending? No, of course not. There were no “come to Jesus” moments as I predicted but I was finally able to empty that jar a little of old emotional pebbles and I feel a lot lighter than I did on Friday. I’ll now have room to work on me and be a better father and husband. And now I am able to start my next journey as a father. That is one journey I’m excited about!
Thank you for taking this journey with me. Hope you get to take one yourself some time.