Page 36 of Delayed Intention
Lily. I just got your letter.
She leaves me on read. At least she’s seeing my message, and I’m not blocked. Yet. Well, as long as I have her attention…
I’m sorry I was an asshole at your grandmother’s house. I was afraid. Please call me if you feel like it. I hope you do
I look over my text messages. She doesn’t respond, but she does read them, and I can admit to myself I don’t deserve any more than that.
Coming Home
Lily, Lincoln, January 2025
Carrying in the last of my smaller boxes, I take the opportunity to survey my new home from the outside. After all of these years, knowing that I belong here with Nona, in this house, it feels like I’ve arrived where I was meant to be all along. Now that the day is here, it’s a wonder to me that I didn’t make this move long ago. I understand how and why I was stuck where I was. Being here now, though, actually moving in, it just feels monumental. Within me, there is a deep sense of peace about this decision that cannot be underestimated.
I walk into the living room where, instead of carpet, there is now hardwood floors and a temporary ramp is in place for Nona’s walker. I stop, placing my box with the others in the hallway outside my room.
“Nona. That is the last of them.” I grin at her, and as happy as I am, my heart squeezes at the sight of her and the walker next to her chair. She looks comfortable enough, sitting with a blanket in her recliner and a romance novel in her hands. “Thank you again for letting me move in.”
“My dear, think nothing of it—you’re a blessing to me. Thank you for making the move out here to babysit me.”
“Nonsense. I’m gonna fix myself a snack and some tea. Would you care for anything?
“I would love a tea, thank you, sweet girl.”
I walk into the kitchen and again am nearly overwhelmed with a sense of rightness about this move. Of course, part of me is terrified. I mean, I’ve become unrecognizable to myself over these last four months. If anyone had asked me a year ago if I’d be moving halfway across the country into my grandmother’s house, I would’ve assumed they were speaking to somebody else. Lily Mendes does not do these things, yet here I am. Of course, I’m afraid because change is scary. At the same time, I’m comforted by the fact that I’ve wanted to move here my entire life. Despite my confidence in this, I can feel my intermittent anxiety nipping at my heels. First of all, I don’t have a job. Not to mention, announcing this move to my parents did not go well, and even though there’s so much more space in my life without the constant aggravation of dealing with my mother, I know that I want to be able to give her my respect and my love.
“Kabbed et abicha v’et-imecha lema’an ya’arikun yameycha,” I mutter to myself, “Honor thy father and mother.” I don’t know Hebrew very well, but this stuck in my head. I think back to some of the learning I did with a Rabbi in the last few years. She had said that the intention, according to some of the Sages, was that we honor the institution of parenthood, not always the people themselves. She also explained that in a situation where an individual has an abusive parent, there are two paths. Accept that the person is evil, and if that is the case, do not fear dishonoring them. Or if the situation is that the person is sick, such as an alcoholic or some other mental health disorder, that path may be found for forgiveness and compassion. A different type of honor. She would emphasize with me each time we met that while we are commanded to honor our parents, it shouldn’t be at the expense of our wellness. That our Creator instructs us in the Torah to be caring of ourselves.
My problem is that I’ve never really understood Ellen Mendes. Can she be so narcissistic that she’s unfeeling toward me? Or is she a lost soul that I should show forgiveness and love for, no matter how I feel about how I’m treated? The truth is I don’t know. And I have yet to find one Rabbi or professional to answer that question for me. It seems to be a journey on which I have to travel on my own.
I sigh. All I can do is take this a day at a time, or in the case of my relationship with my mother, one incident at a time. Every day is a day when I worry that I’m not doing the right thing, that I do nothing but make mistakes one after the other. That is why this feeling of being safe here is bringing tears to my eyes. I rarely feel confident or that I’ve made the right decision, but this move feels more right than most things I’ve ever done. Trust is hard for me, even in God.
I bring a mug of tea out to Nona along with my own, but she has fallen asleep, her paperback askew in her lap. I look at her and wonder for the millionth time in my life how someone so kind and loving could be the parent of my mother. I pull her blanket around her and bookmark her page, take the tea back to the kitchen.
In the hallway outside of my room, I start to tackle my boxes. Nona and I decided that I would take the room closest to her in case she needed me during the night until she was more recovered. I’m also going to take the smallest bedroom and set up a kind of office for my online interviews and therapy sessions. I have an interview later this afternoon, which is a good motivation to start sorting out some of these boxes to find out where at least one business-appropriate shirt is, in addition to the charging cable for my laptop.
I hear a chime on my cell phone and see a text from Cindy, the home health nurse who is coming to help manage Nona’s bandages from her skin tears and surgery. I know enough about adult medicine to know she’s not out of the woods as far as her risk of mortality, and I say a small prayer of healing for her as I start to unpack boxes in my room.
A few hours later, wearing a creased but presentable blouse, I appeared before my laptop for my interview. It is with a medical staffing agency so that I can at least start with temporary work while I search for a position that’s more permanent. A face appears on the screen, and I unmute myself.
“Well, hello there. You must be Lily Mendes.”
“Yes, hello, and you must be Dan Heubner. It is a pleasure to meet you.”
He looks down and shuffles some papers on the desk in front of him. “So I understand from your cover letter that you were at Bethesda Memorial Hospital and the affiliated ED and observation care unit for nearly ten years.”
“Yes. I came out to Nebraska to help care for my grandmother.” A simplification but also a truth.
“And you’ve already begun to work on the process of obtaining a physician assistant license for the state of Nebraska?”
“Yes. It’s already under review. I understand there’s a supervising physician for the agency that will help fill that role until I am placed somewhere more permanently?”
“That’s correct. Whatever needs to be filed for employment at each facility, we’ll help facilitate that with the board of medicine. There is such a shortage of available medical providers in more rural parts of Nebraska that it is a very straightforward process to help meet the needs of these communities.”
He sees the concern on my face and puts his hands up. “Not that you want to work in a rural area—I’m just simply explaining why it is easy for us to expedite the process. I know you want to stay in the Lincoln area close to your family. I already have a position with a primary care clinic just outside of town. They have an immediate need for a part-time PA. It’s a nice office with a good reputation—their current PA has a spouse who is being deployed to another part of the country—otherwise, I’m given to understand that he would be staying on. I also gather from your letter that you are willing to work in any kind of medicine that is not hospital-based medicine.”
“Yes. I want to take advantage of the fact that as a physician assistant, I am beholden to no particular specialty, and I’m willing to stretch my brain a bit to find where I may find a specialty that suits me more. Hospital medicine, particularly observation units, are places I’m more than happy to put behind me.”
We talked further, touching on the usual interview topics: what I perceive as my strengths and weaknesses. I ask about provider safety and their process for screening practices so that no provider is placed in an unsafe or toxic environment. I don’t single out the topic of sexual harassment and am surprised when Daniel does. I suppose in the post-me-too world, it’s expected. I feel relaxed as we talk—a combination of using my talking points from Monica and Roselyn, but also, it’s Daniel himself. He has put worries of mine at ease that I did not have the courage or the language to address on my own. I think I’m going to enjoy working with him.
