Braving Time: Finding the Way Back

By Bonnie L. Collins

Braving Time is a vividly frank, absorbing account of a teenager on the edge of womanhood as she faces loss of her loved ones through death, mental illness, and physical displacement, and how it challenged her feeling of being held safe and connected to those she held dear in the world.

This memoir expresses a universal theme of how we, as humans, internalize such losses, desperately wanting to find someone to fill the gapsomeone to love us deeply, unconditionally; to lead us out of the dark night. We do not see that these lessons are here for us to learn to live authentically, self-reliantly, and with integrity.

The elixir will be when we can trust in ourselves to take good care of our own self (our inner child), to rediscover who we truly are in our own right, and then to revive our essential self. This brings us into healthy connection/belongingness with others, and toward wholeness. This is not a story of wholenessthat would wait for another time. Rather, this is a story of resilience.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Balboa Press
• Release date: Aug 13, 2012
• ISBN: 9781452556376

Bonnie L. Collins

Bonnie L. Collins, nee Hockenberry, is the principal of Life Refocused Associates and is engaged in spiritual/life coaching and book-writing projects. Having studied with the Mentorcoach Training Program, Bonnie has had an active coaching practice since 2004. She works with healthy, creative, resourceful people. Her focus is upon her clients reaching their full potentials. In the past, she has written articles for the Central Pennsylvania Holistic Health Networker, a quarterly journal in central Pennsylvania that promotes healthy living, environmental awareness, and spiritual practice. Bonnie holds a bachelor’s degree (BSS) in psychology and a master’s degree in public administration (MPA). Both were conferred to her by The Pennsylvania State University.

Book preview

Part 1

PROLOGUE (OCTOBER 1955)

Ready or not, here I come! a voice trumpeted from the grassy yard twenty feet away.

A familiar sense of panic set in in the pit of my stomach. My knees grew weak. Would I ever be ready?

Today it was just me and Beth, my next-door cousin, age eleven, and the closest thing I had to a sister. The other neighborhood kids, three boys—one my age, eight and a half, and two younger—had gone home for dinner.

Beth was sharp. Nothing could get past her. She was petite like me; her dark, loosely permed hair gleamed even in the late-day persimmon sky. The last time she hid from me, I couldn’t find her for nearly half an hour. She’d twisted herself up like a pretzel inside a window well behind a large arborvitae. If tagged, she’d untwist and run back across the cinder road that divided our homes to the stone chimney at my house that served as base. She’d be home free in seconds. How did she do it? Almost three years younger, I wanted to be like her, to compete on par with her.

This day, I’d hidden so well she’d never find me. She was not only the best at hiding—she always beat me at anything from checkers to stickball to jump rope. I was sick of it. Worse yet, Mom always unfavorably compared me to her—Beth was the best at everything.

In partial darkness, my feet fairly slid down the low-sloping, slightly muddy, open cellar-way. I crept toward the row of cinderblocks piled a couple of feet high in one corner. Dad’s wheelbarrow stood in front of them. The wheelbarrow was one of several he used to mix the cement for building our new, mostly finished house—the one we already lived in. It had been difficult to climb over the unsteady, porous blocks, but I’d made it into the tight space behind them. I pulled the small, gray tarp over me to secure my hiding spot.

The cool wetness of musty leaves seeped into my sneakers and white socks. Discomfort radiated up my skinny legs. A cold gust of wind stirred, making me shiver beneath my dark blue pedal pushers and causing goose bumps to pop out all over.

"I’m gonna find you, Stringbean!"

Beth’s footsteps massaged the grassy yard. Her movements raced, stopped, then faded, and then grew near again as she checked the usual haunts—by the cellar in her own yard, under the unfinished wooden steps near the back porch of our house, around the corner of the far end of dad’s garage, and behind the nearby crabapple tree.

Oh no, you’re not finding me, Beth—not this time. I barely breathed.

Dad would kill me if he knew I was here. He’d warned me to stay clear of his construction equipment. I’ll skin your hide, he’d said. I knew he loved me and just wanted to protect me—though that wouldn’t stop me from getting a good lickin’ with a pared-thin tree branch if he discovered I’d disobeyed. The cinder blocks were unsafe. One wrong move, and the whole pile might topple.

But I had more pressing issues now; I needed to use the toilet. I was way too old to have an accident. I’d hold things in by resolve. I would not let Beth find me for anything until I was good and ready. It was a matter of pride.

I wanted to be strong like her and her parents, my uncle Leo and aunt Hanna, my dad’s blonde-haired sister, and, above all, I wanted to be strong like my dad. They all worked long hours at the shoe factory, planted and plowed our adjoining fields, and helped one another build each other’s houses from scratch. They were strong—tough—with grit, seemingly unstoppable. Although Beth and I were only children, we were not spoiled. Our respective parents treated us each with a firm hand, but they had soft cores, too. I’d found that whenever I got into trouble, whether I skinned my knee or got flogged by an errant duck from our extended family’s varied covey of animals, Aunt Hanna and Uncle Leo were often the first on the scene to help.

Breathing in the pungent leaf smells made my nose twitch. I tried to stifle a sneeze but woofed out an uncontrollable spray of misty breath. Was she near enough to hear? My heart pounded like a conga drum as I crouched, motionless.

Beth’s footsteps drew near. I see you! She reached under the tarp and tagged my shirt. I threw off the featherlight tarp and, stumbling, made my way out of there, knocking over one of the cinderblocks from on top. Deal with it later—I’d make sure Dad didn’t find out.

There was no time to waste. Beth raced toward base. All-ee, All-ee, in free! she yelled, tagging the white Perma-stone chimney.

Gotta go! See you in a minute, I yelled, leapfrogging up the wood steps past Mom’s rattan laundry basket on the long, wide porch. She’d been hanging wash on the line strung high between evenly set beams.

Swinging open the kitchen door, I dashed toward the yellow and turquoise walls of the bathroom. My bare bottom fell onto the toilet seat and let go. The quick physical relief changed my focus. Now a desolate sensation entered my chest, deflating my mood. I’d lost again to Beth. Shrugging a silent ah well, I pulled myself together, rinsed my hands, and dried them on a fat terry-cloth towel. Then I hurried toward the kitchen. I’d better go set the cinderblock back right away, before Dad finds out I knocked one over, I thought.

Bonnie, it’s dinner time, Mom’s melodic voice sang out. Tell Beth you can play a game later. Go down the field now and get your dad; we’re ready to eat. I think he’s down composting the back quarter acre.

Mom’s dark, slightly salty hair hung over part of her cheek as she stood by the stove stirring the pot of potatoes, beef, carrots, onions, and cabbage—from our recent harvest. The rich smells of Irish stew seeped into me, merging with my marrow.

Okay, Mom. Neither Dad nor I wasted minutes when it came to eating Mom’s good cooking. There would be just enough time to replace the block before I ran to get Dad.

Dinner was our family time, a time when we gathered together, settled into quietness to appreciate the meal and the day, and talked about household chores, my schoolwork, and the family’s plans.

Beth would be home now, too, eating with her family. Afterward, another round or another game, maybe hopscotch or jump rope, would take us roving over this alluring land. Although play ended at 8:00 or 9:00 p.m. on weekends, or until it was too dark for us to see, the game between us was always on.

Life in the rolling hills of central Pennsylvania was a bushel of sunshine, safe and secure. It had a grand palette of color, especially in autumn. Only the seasons changed—the rain to snow and ice and then to wind, before turning back to calm and sun again. How precious the seasons of innocence, and how fleeting. I wanted them to last forever.

Lulled into such a world, you could get lost in the moments where an idyllic dream ebbed day to day, like scenes from a favorite movie. Nothing could prepare me to find that the ground under my very feet would give way. Radical change was, in fact, more than a possibility. It would be, contrary to all my expectations, a certainty.

CHAPTER 1

Ominous Winter (February 22, 1963)

The school bus ground to a stop at the cinder road. My heart danced in jittery excitement as I dropped the foot or so off the bus to cross the main road, RR 147, to the cinder road and ran the thirty yards home.

The gravel crunched under my feet as I hurried toward the house. Soon I’d have my dad back! Our life would finally return to normal. All day, I could think of nothing else. In fact, for the past four weeks, having Dad home with us again was almost all I thought about. Now, finally, it was happening. I could barely wait to wrap my arms around him to welcome him. Would he already be there, or would we make the twenty-five-mile trip to bring him home?

Just the thought of having Dad home again filled me with joy! Oh, Dad, I can’t wait to hug you, to tell you about French class! I need help in algebra. Even though you never had algebra, I know you can help me figure it out. My mind spoke to him as though he were standing right in front of me. My heart flooded with delight.

Due to his back surgery, he probably wouldn’t be able to work his regular job as a machinist in the shoe factory, plow and plant the fields, or fix other people’s cars—at least not right away. Still, life would mostly return to normal. Mom and I just wanted him home.

A shard of bright February sun pierced a high cloud, striking my eyes and temporarily blinding me. Squinting, bracing myself against the cold, and hugging my books, I bunched my coat collar close at the neck for warmth.

Dad’s gray and white 1956 Pontiac rested near the old crabapple tree the same as it had for the month he’d been in the hospital. Even though our car was now seven years old, I really liked it. But Dad had been talking about getting a new one for a while now.

I noticed the trees, too, because I really loved trees, all kinds. Emptied of their leaves, they appeared stark, peaceful, still.

What a relief to be here now—to be home.

Dropping my books on the brown laminate kitchen table, I draped my coat over the back of a chair and strode toward our living room to answer the clanging telephone.

As I lifted the black receiver to my ear, I was surprised to hear our physician’s brawny voice.

This is Dr. Raub.

Hi, I replied with wonderment. I stared at the telephone base unit resting on the unfinished pine desk.

The sound of the furnace kicked in, heightening my awareness of how quiet the house felt. The only other sound was the wheeze of Dr. Raub’s breath into the phone line. Maybe I should call Mom to the phone … but then the doctor’s familiar voice troubled the silence.

"I’m very sorry to be calling, but I have some terrible news for you and your mother—just terrible news. Dr. Raub paused for a breath; then words spilled forth along with his out breath. Today your father had a heart attack. It was very bad, in fact fatal."

Fatal? My brain repeated the word as a silent question. I resisted equating fatal with dead. But … we would be bringing him home this evening … he’d been there a month getting well.

A blood clot from the operation broke loose, hitting his heart and lungs, causing an instantaneous and fatal heart attack, Dr. Raub continued. "I’m sorry."

Doc Raub’s words echoed wildly in my brain without finding a place to land.

Mom! I called out urgently, realizing that we had not yet said hello to one another since breakfast, Come to the phone right away!

Sensing alarm in my voice, she arrived within seconds; I passed the black receiver to her.

Uh … hello? Her salted black hair blurred with the dark receiver.

Was it really true? My thoughts raced together with my heart. I watched my mother as she cradled the phone, then slumped forward, grasping the raw wood of the unfinished desk with her free hand. Her breath thumped out of her.

Oh … Her voice faded as she mechanically returned the receiver to its cradle.

She said not another word.

Is he d … ead? I asked, even though I knew.

Yes, she replied, barely moving or breathing. Her face was gray like cast stone.

Mom and I stood staring at one another while time stopped.

Suddenly, silently, gut churning, and neglecting my coat, I turned and fled next door to inform my close cousin, Beth, and her parents, Dad’s sister and brother-in-law, respectively. Only moments ago, Beth and I had jumped down the foot or so off the school bus together and headed to our respective side-by-side houses.

Beth, now a senior in high school, hunched over the sink washing dishes, was still in her school clothes—dark slacks and a white top, with an apron tied around her waist. She was short-statured like me but had a slightly larger frame. Her short, chestnut, recently permed hair contrasted with my more casual dark blonde wavy tresses. My aunt Hanna and uncle Leo, our second family after all these years, were not yet home from work.

My dad died! I blurted as I found myself in her kitchen, almost a mirror image of our own. How could he be dead? He’d just had his forty-seventh birthday a month ago.

As she turned away from the walnut cupboards to face me, her soapy hands half-grabbed a towel but dripped some suds lightly onto the floor. I saw her reach for words, but like a signal without a transmitter, nothing was sent forth.

No, it can’t be! Her words rushed out as she enfolded the terry-cloth towel with both hands. She stood frozen there.

Yes, my dad is dead! I repeated in angst. The words appeared to hang in midair like captions above caricatures in a magazine as we stood staring at one another.

The years of shared time and memories that bonded Beth and me since we were babes seemed to rise like steam and dissipate. In the moment we were two stunned strangers struggling to communicate. I turned and walked out of their back door just as silently and abruptly as I entered, half-stumbling down the concrete steps, traversing the shared driveway the thirty feet or so to our door.

My skinny five-foot-one-inch, still-growing body shook from the inside as I moved robot-like, up our back steps toward the kitchen. Nerve signals crackled within my frame, transmitting electricity to empty receptors. Without the crackling and quaking in my insides, perhaps there would have been no sense of myself at all. I barely felt my arms and legs although I saw them moving. The world turned in slow motion. My mind, clouded in grayness, called out—make it untrue! God, how could you let this happen?

They’re already on their way here, Mom said to me as I reentered the kitchen.

She had called her sister Reba in Millersburg, a town six miles north. We stood by the dinner table, joined in a gaze at eye level. I lunged to hug her, wanting a strong embrace, but her hug felt light and tentative. She wobbled and sank into her seat at the kitchen table, leaving me holding air.

The sound of tires crunched down the cinder road toward our house. I looked out the window to see Aunt Reba and her husband, Merle. I watched my aunt and Merle get out of the car; their car doors slammed in unison.

I wanted to run to Reba, but my feet froze to the floor. Aunt Reba was a dear soul; her kind and sweet spirit guided me throughout my childhood, like a second mother.

Their footsteps grew louder. Floorboards creaked on the back porch, and then the kitchen door swung open.

Aunt Reba’s arms reached out to me. I fell into them and wept.

I hugged my aunt’s small, ample body as she tried to assure me. "Don’t worry; we’ll help you through this difficult time. There, there, Bonnie," Aunt Reba said as she patted my head softly. I sobbed and sobbed away.

What could possibly help us now? Life without my dad was unimaginable. Who would see me through? Who would help my mother in her need? Dad was everything; he made our family complete.

Finally, I unclenched myself from Reba and sat at the table, folding my head into the square of my arms, sobbing and sobbing, using up boxes of tissues that she brought to me, but no comfort came—only emptiness.

I looked up toward Mom. She’d begun to pace back and forth in front of the kitchen’s long aqua-toned countertop. The few gray streaks in her hair seemed to age her in the moment, but she still looked pretty. I focused upon her, waiting to see what her words would be.

What am I going to do? She repeated again and again, perhaps to Uncle Merle or to the air, each time emphasizing a different word. Her gaze had fallen into some far-off and unfamiliar land. It was hard for me to witness her torment.

As evening came, Reba made me tea, but ill and purged by sorrow, I could not keep anything down. Life had crossed over into a wintry and frozen land where time was absolutely stopped, unlike the fond winters of my childhood.

Mom and Merle were still in the kitchen, maybe ten feet away. I could hear their voices through the open door of my bedroom. Reba held a metal pan that I retched into. Her company salved my heart a bit, but it couldn’t settle my stomach. I felt that I’d never sleep again—never be okay again.

I’m sorry, Luella, Merle said, pausing. We’ll plan the funeral over the next few days.

I imagined poor Mom taking this in. I had not heard her say a word for what seemed like the last hour; nor did I hear her cry.

Merle continued. Don’t worry, Luella, but, I doubt you and Bonnie can stay here. It would be too much for you to handle alone.

Where will we go? I heard Mom utter in a forlorn, broken voice.

We’ll move you back to Millersburg, where you’ll be near us.

I wanted Mom to tell Merle, "No, we’ll stay here, and we’ll make it on our own." But it was too much for her … for me too.

CHAPTER 2

Wilderness

Mom would surely get stronger and tell Merle, we are not moving! Anyway, how could we leave here? Dad built this place for us. In my fifteen years on earth, it was all I’d ever known.

I sat alone in the rectangular living room of our ample house listening to the hard rain—drawing in more emptiness, making the void more palpable. I still had until May to finish my sophomore year here. That would be time enough, I hoped, for Mom to come around to seeing that we must stay. There was no question about it, I assured myself.

For a long minute, I listened to the updraft of beating rain, then to its fading to near silence. I swallowed hard. Mad with fear and anguish—mad at God for taking Dad. It felt all wrong. How would the God that Mom taught me about let this happen?

I sat on the old, soft chair, and was again at Dad’s funeral, reeling—at the casket that had held his lifeless body.

He had not looked the same. Makeup covered his scars from shrapnel from his military service in World War II. Yet it was my dad lying there in his beautiful brown pinstriped suit, auburn hair smoothed out on a satin pillow.

I kept telling God that I loved Dad so much—I still believed in God. I wanted him to tell me why my father had to go from us; I wanted to bargain. I’d be good forever if only I could have Dad back. After all, if, as in the Bible, Lazarus could be raised from the dead, then why not Dad? Would God answer my prayer, my plea? There was only silence. Still, I knew God was there, or at least I believed so. Smelling the fragrant incense of mixed floral bouquets, I decided to ask God to give Dad many blessings and especially to take good care of him.

But what good could my prayers do now? Of what use was my anger? So sad, so alone, I couldn’t believe that I had no control over any of this. I hugged my pillow on my lap as happy family memories—of backyard picnics, short summer vacation drives, and helping Dad plant our garden plot—flooded into my mind.

Another burst of rain pelted the hard ground. How had all this come about? I desperately wanted to make sense of it.

Just over a month ago I’d prodded, What’s the matter, Dad?

Dad, having just returned from work, could barely get out of his car, or take a step. His clear blue eyes were tightly focused, immersed in small, tormented movements. The trunk of his body was bent and stiffened. It must have been an ordeal to drive the six miles home.

It’s my back. I just need to get into the house.

Wincing, he heaved himself forward in a slow, stiff, jerky motion. Never had I seen my dad in pain before. I wanted to help him, but impelled by duty, he insisted on soldiering on alone, gradually willing himself toward the back screen door. As he did so, I sensed the wearying, sobering truth of it, that somehow this would not be easily remedied. He made it into the house.

That was the beginning.

Since Mom didn’t drive, Aunt Hanna and Uncle Leo took me, Mom, and Beth in their car to visit Dad in the Harrisburg Hospital. Uncle Leo was several inches shorter than my dad, who stood five feet ten. Mom, I, and sometimes Beth, sat in the back seat of the 1959 Chevy while Uncle Leo drove, with Aunt Hanna in the passenger seat.

Aunt Hanna, my dad’s only sister, was a handsome woman, of average height with a medium frame and coarse, dark blonde hair like mine. All of them were constantly working, often helping one another with some project or other on our adjoining properties. Our families relied on one another for any need or emergency all the time I was growing up. Ours was an efficient, caring, tiny community.

On the drives to the hospital, few words were spoken. It seemed that none of us could believe that a man so strong and active all of his life could be in this predicament.

When we’d visited my dad, sometimes we’d leave Dad and Mom alone together to talk. I’d follow Aunt Hanna to the nurses’ desk while she asked the nurse about his condition and test results.

He seems to be getting better, I heard the young nurse say, as she sat pouring over some charts.

I’d gazed down at the wool red and gray sweater I was wearing, and walked over and sat on a bench by the elevators. Mom, who regularly knitted me things, had made the beautiful matching scarf to go with it that was now cast over a visitor’s chair in Dad’s room.

Soon I’d return to Dad’s room and give him a big smile and a kiss on the cheek. My prayers to God were being answered, it seemed. I had always believed that all would be well if we did the right thing. Visiting Dad, caring for his needs, and praying for him fell into that category. Mom and Dad hadn’t taught me this in these exact words, but by observation and with prayer, it was what I’d come to believe. All would be well again at our house. It would just take time.

If only all things had turned out well in truth. Life surely felt different now. Hanna, Leo, Beth, and Gram were in their own houses next door doing their own grieving. It felt extra lonely not seeing them every day.

Feeling my eyes fill with tears, my heart wept. An emptiness filled me. I wondered if life would ever be enjoyable again—if I’d ever be me again. I just couldn’t imagine it. The rain itself felt permanent.

An hour passed. I walked out to the kitchen and stood by the stove.

Mom appeared and plopped herself into a chair at the dining table across from where Dad used to sit. They’d been bookends; I’d sat in the middle facing the sink.

Mom, I’m going to make some hot dogs and cook some potatoes, okay?

I walked over to the refrigerator, opened the freezer door, and looked inside. Then I closed that door and opened the door to the ’fridge. We still had food in the freezer and in the refrigerator. I took out some hot dogs and potatoes. I remembered too that we had more potatoes in the cellar that Dad harvested last summer. Anyway, if we didn’t eat them soon, they’d go to spud.

Okay, she said, after some hesitation.

Fixed in her chair with a cup of tea and a magazine in front of her, she mostly looked down at her hands, studying her