Cousins

It’s Saturday now, a legit hot sunny summer morning in June after weeks of weather better suited for April than June. Two years ago, 9 AM on a Saturday morning in June would have found me on the pool deck with a whistle or stopwatch around my neck, but instead I’m on my patio listening to the cheering and the whistles and the Colorado starter as I sit in my pajamas writing. The pool is just a little more than a block from my house. Other people always told me that you could hear the noise from the meets for a several block radius, and they were right. 

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Last week - a week ago today - my cousin died. She was 47. She never married and she never had children, and she had a lot of problems, sadly. She had a hard time with other people - she wasn’t mean or anything - far from it, really. She just didn’t know how to navigate the world. Lots of people are like that, and I wish we could make more room for them. I wish we could all be kinder and more accepting. 

My cousin also had a lot of health problems, some related to mental illness and substance misuse, but not all. She struggled a lot this last year or so. She was hospitalized last year for a bit, and when she got out, I sent her a letter and an Ulta gift card. Her mother, my aunt on my mother’s side, called me to tell me that I could not have picked a better thing to send her because she loves cosmetics and fancy skin care but doesn’t often have the extra money to buy them. I was glad I could make her happy for a little bit. 

I saw her a few months later at my mother’s 80th birthday party. She did not look well, and she was oddly clingy with me. It was almost as if we were children again, me the 14-year-old oldest grandchild and she the two-year-old youngest of the grandchild crew, toddling around after me wherever I went. I stayed with her and brought her snacks and drinks and listened to her complaints about her job and her excited chatter about concerts she was planning to attend. And even though there was something very obviously off about her demeanor, I was glad she still felt comfortable hanging around with me and I enjoyed listening to her. That was the last time I saw her, and I’m glad I spent time with her. I’m glad she had a good time at the party. I hope she’s at peace now. 

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I can hear shouts of “GO! GO! GOOOOOOO!” from here. That’s my son cheering for his swimmers. He sounds like a 20-year-old male version of me at a swim meet. And now it’s go time for me. 

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Given what happened last week and especially given what happened last night, Saturday was an oddly peaceful day. I dropped into the neighborhood swim meet to see my son coaching his kids, and to say hi to my swim parent friends, and then I went to yet another swim meet, to see my 12-year-old nephew and my 8-year-old niece. They both crushed it - my niece won her freestyle event with an All-Stars qualifying time, and my nephew also did very well. When I ran over to congratulate him after his 50 breaststroke race, he said “I didn’t know you were coming, but I could hear you yelling GOOOOOO!” “You swim like Evan,” I said. This is high praise from me, and high praise to a boy who idolizes his older cousin. 

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My younger cousin’s funeral is tomorrow. We’ll go to New Jersey in the morning and come back in the afternoon. We thought about going for a few days but we decided against it. If anything happens, I want to be close to home.