Elizabeth Anne Willard (“Mom”) 1921-2007

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My mother, Elizabeth Anne Willard, passed away last Wednesday, April 4, 2007, at Overlook Hospital in Summit, N.J. She was 85.

Mom went into the hospital on my birthday, October 15, and had a heart operation the next day. The operation itself was a success, but Mom experienced a series of complications that kept her shuttling between four different hospitals during the next six months. Her dream of returning to the home in which she had lived for the past 48 years was never to come true.

Just two weeks ago, things were looking up. She was wearing her own clothes (no more hospital gowns) and eating meals at a table with other residents at the rehab center. But then came an email from my brother with the dreaded word, “pneumonia.” The next day, another email arrived from my other brother, this time mentioning a heart attack. The next day, I was informed that Mom had become unresponsive. My sister-in-law said she suspected Mom was holding on just so she could see me, and by 5 p.m. last Tuesday my son Kevin and I were on the road for the six-hour drive from Rochester to New Jersey.

We arrived at 11 p.m. and went straight to the hospital. It was after hours but the nurse let us in. Mom had an oxygen mask on and stared straight up at the ceiling. She didn’t show any recognition that we were there, but I have no doubt that she knew of my presence as I spoke to her and stroked her hair and kissed her on the forehead and cheek.

We didn’t stay long, maybe 5 or 10 minutes. I was concerned that it was upsetting for Kevin, who is 14, to see his grandmother like that. I wish I had said something meaningful and profound, but I fully expected to be back the next day and see that she was fine again. My last words to her, spoken into her ear, were, “Good night. I’ll see you tomorrow. You’ll feel better tomorrow.”

Kevin and I left for Mom’s house, 10 minutes away, and went to sleep. At 4 a.m., we were awoken by my brother, who said we needed to get to the hospital quickly. The streets were deserted and he went through a few red lights, but by the time we arrived, Mom was gone.

Over the next few days, my relatives arrived from California, Kentucky, Ohio, Virginia and Maryland. Many people came to the funeral home for visitation last Saturday and Sunday, and I remarked that Mom had succeeded in getting us all together for Easter. I was fortunate to have an interpreter both days, including when more than 25 family members gathered Sunday night at Mom’s house for what my brother jokingly called a Marco Polo-themed dinner (Italian and Chinese food).

Monday morning was the funeral, and both of my brothers gave moving eulogies. Again, I was lucky to have an interpreter. We brought Mom to the cemetery and laid her next to my father, who had been waiting patiently since he passed away 13 years earlier. After a luncheon, my family members began to return home to their own lives. It was sad to see them go.

Mom was the one who first identified my hearing loss when I was 8 years old. Relatives and teachers thought I was a smart-aleck because I was responding inappropriately or ignoring them altogether. Mom was a school nurse (and had previously been a hospital nurse and an Army nurse in World War II) and that summer she brought home a new audiometer to try out on the family. Even my elderly grandfather passed the test, but I was missing out on the high frequencies.

Mom took me to specialists in New York City and was heartbroken when one doctor told her that my progression into profound deafness was inevitable. My hearing continued to worsen throughout my teen years. There was never any discussion of sending me to a deaf school, as I managed to do well as a mainstreamed student back in the days before mainstreaming was even a concept. (For a photographic look at my journey into deafness, visit www.tomwillard.com/the_wondering_years.pdf.)

In 1980, I took a couple of sign language classes at Union College in Cranford, N.J., and in the fall I entered the National Technical Institute for the Deaf, a college of Rochester Institute of Technology. I was never very good at lipreading (I think it’s a skill that you either have or you don’t) so Mom decided to take sign classes at Union College, too. She was 60 years old, a tough age at which to learn a new language. She never got past the basic signs and fingerspelling, but that was enough to keep us in touch. She continued to fingerspell to me even after arthritis made it painful.

In a way, I was lucky to be deaf because Mom and I communicated through letters. I still have all the letters she sent to me over the years, and we found two file boxes filled with all my letters in her bedroom. My siblings communicated through phone calls, which disappear into thin air, so all they have left are their memories.

Mom never let me use my hearing loss as an excuse, and she always said it was up to me to make other people feel comfortable with me and my deafness. It has not always been easy, but it was good advice and something I still try to keep in mind.

I always knew this day would come, but that doesn’t make it any easier. I was fortunate to have my Mom around for nearly 50 years.

Good night, Mom. I love you, and I hope you feel better now.

P.S. … I shot the video above last July after Kevin planted flowers alongside Mom’s house.

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