They Say a Picture is Worth a Thousand Words

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. I must have two thousand snapshots of my life. They are the kind of photos that you would expect a girl to have. Many of them mark first days of school. Each year I would stand in front of my mother’s 1974 boxy, burgundy Volvo, grinning with one or two missing teeth and clutching my new Strawberry Shortcake lunch box.

Many of those pictures mark the in-between days of school. I have a box full of pictures of my stint on the Homecoming Court in high school and of my dates to the junior and senior prom. I have captured snippets of my stint on the Court -- fidgety and feeling out of place -- with the popular girls and their mothers who all wear the right clothes and say the right words. There is a black and white photo of a silly moment in the homecoming parade where I get to wave like a beauty queen for my mom and friends as I ride by in a convertible. There are Kodak moments where I pin the boutonniere on my junior and senior prom dates – both of whom were named Brent and taller than me by two feet. They look fidgety and out of place wearing the same color cummerbund as the taffeta of my dress.

And the movies we have? Priceless. We grew up on the cusp of the digital age and our home movies are now VHS tapes in my living room. I have a catalog of my arrival home from a mission trip, my first experience on a theater stage, my own march across the Peace College front lawn to accept my Associate of Arts degree, the video of my wedding day. 

But what do you do for those moments in your life where there are no cameras to mark a milestone?  I’m not talking about those moments when you wish aloud, If only I had a camera for this. Not those moments when you realize you’ve forgotten the full-color thirty-five millimeter film or the memory stick is full or that the battery power had failed. Not for the moments where you want to catch your nephew face-down in his first birthday cake. Or the moments that your husband might become a finalist on America’s Funniest Home Videos right after he says: Hey, Honey, watch this! 

I am talking about those moments when the flash of recognition of knowing becomes as bright as halogen or the faith within you fails. Those moments when a milestone slams down behind you so that you cannot turn back to the way it was and you know that you will forever be something new. There is rarely a Polaroid that captures growth.

I don’t think we have any pictures of me, or Daddy or Anna or Mama on the day she was diagnosed.  I have snapshot of memories of that day.  I remember how beautiful it was in Chapel Hill, even for January.  The air was crisp and clear, the sky was an unbelievable blue.  I remember the parts of the drive from my apartment near campus to Duke Hospital. There were patches of snow on the north facing hills. I remember the way the wind felt at crosswalk leaving the parking deck and heading into the main entrance. 

I remember walking into mom’s hospital room and leaning against the far wall while the nurse finished up her admitting vitals check and opened the window blinds.  I remember sliding down the wall and feeling my butt bumping against the tile floor when I heard the nurse say, “Mrs. Formy-Duval, your girls won’t have to worry, leukemia is not hereditary.”

I’ve never been fond of hospitals.  When I was fifteen, the youth group leader at my church and his wife became the proud parents of a sweet baby girl.  Of course, all twelve girls from the high school youth group at Myrtle Grove Presbyterian Church went to visit mere hours after Karen had given birth. As everyone oohed and ahhed over the new addition, I excused myself to throw up in a bathroom down the hall.  I don’t know what it was: the smell of cleaning chemicals, the thought of pain, the idea of blood. 

Moments later I crawled into the empty bed next to the new mother.  My own mom, who had ferried three or four of us to the hospital, brought me a 7-Up and placed cool towels on my neck. 

“Beth what are we gonna say if the minister comes in and sees you laying there?” she joked. “He’s gonna think you’re knocked up!”  All the girls in the room giggled, and I’m sure I turned crimson, but I was thankful for Mama’s distraction.

Mama didn’t have a humorous quip for the nurse’s remark, or for the expression on my face as I melted against the wall and into a puddle on the floor.  I only heard muffled voices anyway and felt my tongue go numb.  Daddy and Anna helped me from the floor and moved me over to the bed.  I sat at her feet for a minute before asking Mama if I could lay down beside her. 

“I’m sorry,”  Daddy was saying to me.

Mama interrupted, “we wanted to tell you ourselves.  I’m sorry.  The doctors think I may have leukemia.”

Mama’s nonchalance didn’t ease the heavy feeling in my head or the twisting in my stomach.  Her voice denied whatever fear she may have been feeling at the time.  It was as if this happened everyday to her, to us. I rested my head on her shoulder and took deep breaths.

The silence was broken by a knock on the door and Grandaddy’s whistling. Nanny smiled her worried smile.  She only had two smiles, her worried smile and her genuine smile. As I lay beside Mama, I groaned:  half at the migraine that pounded in the back of my head and half at the smile.  Perhaps I knew even then that my grandmother’s genuine smile would become as rare as the healthy blood cells in my mother’s veins.

“Which one of you is sick,” my grandfather asked.  “You both look horrible.”  I rolled my eyes and tried to smile. Half of my face was numb and my vision was beginning to blur.  I could see him take off his hat and rub his hand over his bald scalp.  He looked out of place in a hospital.  Everyone called him Jelly, and I think there were only a few places that he felt comfortable:  His green recliner on the front porch, a deer stand in the green swamp and the kitchen table.  He complained about every where else, whether he was comfortable or not.

“What’s wrong with you?”  Nanny asked me. “Is it the hospital?” She was wearing a red sweater and a blue skirt.  Her face blurred as she got closer and I was glad I could no longer see her worried smile. 

“I think I have a migraine.”

“You do?” Mama asked. 

The room suddenly melted into a fuzzy fury that I barely remember. Blurred vision is an amazing gift I learned that first day and carried with me through much of mom’s treatment.