in the case of death

 

Folk remedies have always fascinated me.

Like this one, found in M.F.K. Fisher’s A Cordiall Water: A garland of Odd and Old Recipes to Assuage the Ills of Man & Beast:

To break a fever, as in measles

Gather plenty of turds from the wild jackrabbit, and dry them in the oven to keep for the winter in a jar. when a fever will not break; make a very strong tea of the dung and hot water, strain it, and drink it every half-hour until the sweating starts. This never fails.

I am not through with the book yet, as this has been assigned my lavatory literature, but there was one “remedy” that had stayed with me for the past days. I just could not shake it off.

Fisher once met this old woman in Provence, no taller than half her height, teeth all gone, whom she was certain was very sound in her mind. This old woman saw two little kids trying to be naughty to toads and was appalled. After Fisher helped avert any harm intended towards the toads, the old woman, relieved, told of the story why toads were of importance to her…

When she was a little girl, she contacted typhoid fever and had died. For two days she laid on the bed, as people in her village, as was the custom in her village then, came and sat and wept and drank and talked, and sprinkled holy water on her head. And then the priest came in, for she was to be buried the following day. After he left, her mother shouted, “no, no!” and ran out of the house with a pillow case in her hand.

Her mother later returned, with a dozen live toads clumsily trying to hop in the pillowcase which she held in one hand. In the other hand was a live pigeon.

She tied the mouth of the pillowcase firmly and then placed that thumping, hopping case of toads at the feet of the little dead girl. The live pigeon she spilt and clapped upon her child’s head, letting the warm blood gush down her chilled skin.

And, that was how life returned to her and she lived to an ancient age, shriveled and shrunk, teeth all lost, to save the toads, whom she called her protector and friend. For she believed the toads had warmed her cold feet when she laid dead.

::

I thought to myself this:

Holy crap. You gave up too easily, you fool. What did you do? You wished against wish and you hoped against hope. You tried to wake up from a bad dream. You wished it was just a very big and stupid mistake. You hoped that you would miraculously hear a baby cry when he was born. You thought maybe the doctor will discover that the baby still had a faint breath of life in him… you stupid idiot. You should have read this book earlier and gone out to catch a dozen toads and a pigeon you could easily find and spilt in two. Can you imagine?! You could have saved your son… …

For a few days I was just twisted and warped. Modern doctors like to dismiss folk remedies as hocus-pocus, as unreliable and dangerous methods. They are not studied and has no scientific backing. I don’t care for scientific backing in this case. Really, if that could save my son, I would spilt a pigeon in half. I wondered if I would really run out and hunt down a dozen live toads and a pigeon if I had read this book before Ferdinand died. But if I read this, and I could not find a dozen toads, I think I would have killed myself. Either way, there is just no way out.

::

I am still reading and wonder if there will be a cure for a broken heart. There must be one? I will let you know if I come across it. Or perhaps a remedy for the heaviness in one’s bosom when the days begin to shorten and the air begin to chill.

My unrest too related to news of a sudden death on R’s side of the family. An uncle at age 58, lung emboly. A most healthy and fit man, who flew over twice from Germany to participate in the NY marathon. Just like that. He was in his home that Saturday morning, and by evening, his children called home from colleges, his widow preparing for his funeral, making the dreadful phone calls. Tears. One life forever ended. Three lives changed. My heart breaks to think of how his children shook to hear their mother’s voice breaking the news. Especially the son. He has curly hair like one of my girls and loved music and I still smile to recall him telling me he will come to the US and open an El.vis Pres.ley restaurant and hotel. My heart just breaks, breaks, breaks. I mourn deeply, even though I am not close to their family.

::

Before I came here I looked on my Reader quickly, which has some 198,763 unread posts, and saw Tash posting about the sui.cide of German goalkeeper Robert Enke. It brought me to my knees and I think it broke the dams too.

To choose death, is a big decision. It means one has no more desires (except to die), and even having loved ones cannot keep one going, from getting up every morning and putting one foot in-front of another. When after Ferdinand died and there were days when I felt like giving up, the thought of the girls going through the death of their mother always pulled me back from the edge. But some times, I guess, even the heart is not strong enough and something else just takes over. Being alive now, today, made me realize how close I was to death and it made me teared up.

::

Death may mean an end, but it hardly is an end for the survivors. Reminders pop up and as best as you can manage, there will be moments when you just keel over in disbelief.

In the case of death, there is no cure, there is no end.