In My Final Moments

I remember I got sick on Friday. On Thursday I felt fine. I came home and I did my chores. I fed the horse and cleaned her stall. I fed the chickens. I did my homework with my sister Olivia and my brother Isaac by the light of the oil lamp. Isaac and I went to bed. Olivia climbed into her bed too shortly thereafter. Mother put out the oil lamp and she went to bed a little bit later. Father always came in after we were all asleep. Yes, I am sure this is what happened because this was always what happened every night. Isaac and I woke up on Friday morning and our clambering about woke Olivia. We always woke her up every morning and to tell you the truth, we did it on purpose, just to annoy her. I do remember I was not feeling well and I told mother about it. She asked me where I hurt and I said my head and my side. She felt my head and said I felt fine but said I could stay home from school. I told her no. I said I wanted to go to school and I did. I liked walking with Isaac and Olivia down by the creek into town. We sang songs as we walked. Olivia had a far better voice than Isaac or I. Sometimes we just let her sing by herself so we could enjoy the song. At other times we sang different songs than she sang and frustrated her to no end. Sometimes it was just a contest of who could sing the loudest and drown the other one out. I also wanted to see my best friends Benjamin and Edward. They lived on the other side of town so the only time I got to see them was at school. So, mother packed our lunches and off we went. Olivia sang “Row Row Row your Boat and Isaac sang “Dixieland”. I sang a little of one and then a little of the other. It made my sister so very annoyed but I thought it was great fun. I remember the weather was getting chilly and mother gave us all an extra shirt she had made of some flannel material and I was glad to have it as we walked. The wind felt damp and chilly.
We arrived at school and sat down. I still wasn’t feeling well. The pain in my side was getting worse and my head felt like it was being trampled by a herd of stampeding cattle. I put my potato on the stove in the middle of the classroom so it would be done by lunch time. Everyone seemed to take a potato that day. Maybe because it was Friday. I sat at my normal seat with Edward but I didn’t feel like talking very much. I felt like I should go home but I dreaded the long walk alone. We worked on our letters and learned some history. I do remember that. I remember Alice Jones got the answer wrong to “When was the war of 1812?” I felt very ill but I couldn’t help laugh at that. It was very funny. At recess I sat alone on the steps of the schoolhouse. I didn’t feel like playing. Isaac and Olivia were worried but I told them I would be fine. I watched Isaac playing baseball and thought he was getting really good. Our practice at home was doing him good. Then, Mrs. Stevenson rang the bell and I stood up. That is the last thing I remember from school.
I woke up at home in my bed already dressed in my nightclothes. Mother was wiping down my forehead with a wet rag. My head hurt worse than at school and my side felt like someone was driving a knife into it. Mother told me I collapsed at school and Mrs. Stevenson sent Billy Cooper to fetch the doctor. He brought me back home in his wagon. I thought that was odd. I couldn’t remember any of it. Then I fell back to sleep I think.
When I awoke again, Olivia and Isaac were home from school and I could tell it was dark outside. I still felt tired and my head hurt very badly. My side didn’t hurt as much as before. It crossed my mind that I might be getting better but Isaac and Olivia were crying. Mother was sobbing. Father just stood looking as though he had no emotion. It was eerie. Dr Morgan was in the room too. He kept checking his pocket watch for some reason. I felt sorry that my being sick must be keeping him from an appointment or something else he had to do. Then the Reverend came by to comfort mother and father. I thought this was very strange. I wondered what had happened that the minister had to come by. I was worried something awful had happened to someone somewhere and they were waiting to tell me until I felt better. I hoped it wasn’t one of my friends. Mother sat down in the rocking chair she had placed by the bed and Isaac climbed onto her lap. I could see it from the corner of my eye. I want to tell him to get down. He was 8 years old and too old to be sitting on mothers lap like a baby but I couldn’t speak. My head hurt too badly. I told myself whatever bad thing had happened I, at 11 years old, was far too big to be sitting in mother’s lap and I would not do it, not matter what it was. Then I fell back to sleep again I think but I am not sure.
The third and final time I awoke it was still dark outside. Mother was still crying. Isaac was sitting on the end of the bed silently crying but trying to be a man. Olivia was rubbing Isaac’s head. Father was crying. The Reverend was reading out of a book but I could not make out his words. I could not make out any of the words anyone was saying. It was as if their mouths were moving but they had no sound. Then I realized my ears had stopped working. I could hear nothing. The large pine tree that normally brushed against the window in the night and scared the three of us to death, was eerily silent. I wondered what would make my ears stop working. Then I felt my chest tighten and my throat seize up. Mother stood up and wiped my face. She burst into sobs. I looked over at father and he was sobbing. They were both speaking to me but I could hear no sound. Olivia held my hand and Isaac rubbed my forearm. Then…….. something remarkable happened. I got up. Well, I say I got up but I also stayed in the bed. I was so confused. I turned and looked at myself on the bed. I thought this was very strange. I was scared. I saw father reach down and kiss my forehead. Mother sank to her knees. Dr. Morgan checked his pocket watch again and then pulled the sheet up over my face. He then squatted down next to mother and spoke to her. My ears now worked and I could hear him say “It will be alright Mary. He is with G-d now”. It was only then that I realized what had happened. I had died. I felt sheer terror. I wanted to scream out “I am right here. Look at me. I am not dead!” but I had no voice. I felt so sad for my family and I felt sad for me. Slowly I realized Dr Morgan was right and I was dead but what did that mean? “What am I suppose to do now?” I thought. I wondered who would help father on the farm. Isaac was not quite old enough or big enough to be much help. It seemed like a million thoughts flooded into my mind all the same time. I wondered how Isaac would learn to play baseball properly without my help. I was a fantastic baseball player if I do say so myself. I looked over at mother and she looked so helpless. I put my arm on her shoulder but she could not feel it. She felt something though, I am sure of that, for she pulled her shawl up around her tighter and held onto it with both hands. Father mumbled to mother that he was going to the undertaker. Mother just sat on the floor sobbing. Isaac and Olivia ran to her and she hugged them. I watched as they sat there like that for a very long time. All three sobbing and holding tightly to each other. No one seemed to be able to even make the slightest movement. I looked at the boy I used to be, laying there on the bed, covered in a sheet. I felt cheated somehow but also peaceful. It is hard to describe.
I stayed there until father came back with the undertaker. They brought a coffin in the house and I felt very scared. I didn’t know why. The boy on the bed seemed to have little connection to me any longer but I still found it disconcerting. Father and mother dressed me in my Sunday clothes. They cried the whole time and I felt so sorry for them. Then father took my body down from the loft and he and Mr. Lafferty, the undertaker, put me in the coffin. Mr. Lafferty hugged mother and told her what a nice boy I was and how the town will miss me. She sobbed louder. Then Mrs. Lamb from the next farm to the west of us came over. She hugged mother, who was, by then, sitting in a rocking chair by the fire, and told her she was sorry. Reverent Lafferty said there would be a service at the church around 4pm. Mr., and Mrs. Stone came by. Mr. Stone shook fathers hand and told him he was sorry. Mrs. Stone helped mother up from her chair and the two of them walked back into mother and father’s bedroom. I just stood there. I wanted to scream out, “I am here!” but when I tried I found that again, there were no words. I watched this all unfold, people coming and going, until the sun was very high in the sky and the darkness had given way to the daylight many hours before. Somehow it all seemed more shocking in the light of day. Since I died at night it was more like a scary story being played out. In the daylight it all seemed much more permanent somehow. Mr. Lafferty said he was heading into town and he and father loaded my coffin onto his wagon.
I took a look around outside. I wondered if Isaac would be able to take care of Bits, our old mare or if father would have to do it and then I went back inside the house. I didn’t have to open the door. I just somehow went from outside to inside. It was very hard to explain. Mrs. Stone and mother had come from her bedroom and mother was dressed up now but still crying. Mrs. Stone told mother it was time. Somehow time seemed to be something I was having trouble comprehending. It did not seem to be passing for me like it always had. I found it confusing. I looked over and saw Isaac and Olivia dressed up too. I wanted to laugh because Isaac was yanking at his collar. He hated collars that buttoned around his neck. Father came in from outside and said he would change quickly. He was gone just a little while then came back into the main room with his Sunday suit on. Then everyone got up and into their wagons and drove into town. I wanted to go and see what was happening and upon that thought, I found myself in town in front of the school that serves as a church on Sunday. I saw my friends going into the school with their parents. A few were crying. I sat and listened to the minister but I have no idea what he said. I was too busy watching the people who sat there listening to him. I thought all of a sudden that I really wasn’t too big to sit on mother’s lap and wished I could. Then in what seemed like a flash it was over and the people came out of the church and I wondered what would happen next. “What am I suppose to do now?” I thought again. I noticed the people were all walking east along the path that leads to just outside of town and I realized they were headed to the graveyard. It felt odd to see father, Dr. Morgan, Mr. Lafferty and Mr. Phelps carry the coffin that I knew contained my body, when I was here, walking with the people who had attended my funeral service. Several women were helping mother walk, she seemed to barely be able to take a step forward and Mrs. Stevenson held Isaac and Olivia’s hands. Then we stopped at a square hole that I knew had been dug for my coffin. The reverend said some things and then everyone turned and walked away but I was rooted to the spot. Try as I might, I could not move. When the people of my town were out of sight, several men started to fill the hole back in with dirt. They gossiped as they worked and I thought it odd and somehow unfair. Their lives were going on and mine was over far too early. It all seemed so final. As the hole filled up with dirt the realization of my own death sank in even deeper and somehow seemed to sink into my brain as the hole itself was filled in with shovelfuls of dirt. When their work was done, the men turned and left and left me alone in a box in the ground and at the same time, standing there beside my own grave. Then I felt a sense of great peace wash over me and a feeling of unbelievable happiness come upon me until I was no longer standing by the grave of the dead boy I no longer was. I was with G-d.
I do know that a few weeks later, mother, father, Isaac and Olivia came by and put a stone upon my final resting spot on earth. It said
Henry George Pate
Born May 28, 1879
Died May 20, 1890
You will be forever missed