SEPTEMBER 15, 2023 – My life at this stage of the story—the day after the blow-up—was not entirely consumed by matters in Rutherford, New Jersey. The normal stresses and strains of life continued unabated. Our oldest son Cory was giving us a run for our money, and Byron was heavily involved in a host of extra-curricular activities and beginning his wide-angle college search. Meanwhile, the relentless cats and squirrels of my work world were on the loose and in some cases on the rampage. I had to leave my failed New Jersey mission . . . in New Jersey . . . and return to the daily circus of “normal life.”
Before re-entering the Big Top, however, I took a quick trip to Anoka to brief Mother and Dad on my latest failure in New Jersey.
The weather was beautiful but hot, and I found solace in the generous shade that sheltered the old quiet neighborhood at the end of Rice Street along the Mississippi River. I espied Mother tending her flowerbeds deep in the backyard and took advantage of her preoccupation by corralling Dad alone inside. I gave him a detailed account of my trip to Rutherford, and characteristically, he listened attentively. Dad’s extraordinary capacity for describing details rendered him well-disposed to listening to them.
Eventually, we went outside. I approached Mother and found her still wholly absorbed in her horticultural pursuit in credible mimicry, I thought, of UB. We exchanged pleasantries and small talk about her garden. She seemed to be sailing on an unusually even keel. UB, I’d noticed over my many trips to Rutherford, was likewise calmest when planting his tulip bulbs, weeding his flower beds, or examining the leaves of his tomato plants under the magnifying glass he always carried with him.
A while later Dad, Mother, and I repaired to the living room, where Mother asked as she did unfailingly at the outset of every visit, “Would you like a glass of water?”
With glass in hand, I presented a much condensed version of what I’d previously given Dad. At the conclusion, Mother asked, “So where does your conflict with Uncle Bruce put me?”
“Well, uh, I’ve been trying to reduce the conflict,” I said half-mumbling, “but he’s not always receptive to reason, you see, and he resists help and ideas and doesn’t like questions and is so unorganized and disordered and . . .” My inarticulate response was a measure of my growing dismay: Mother’s inheritance meant little to . . . Mother. Her relationship with her brother, having grown more distant and irregular since Gaga’s death, was now her principal concern, as far as anything “out East” was concerned. And if my sisters were interested in my periodic reports about UB, my dear sisters were fully immersed in life light years from 42 Baghdad Street.
At the time only Nina, who was most attached to Hamburg, seemed to share my worry about losing that legacy property to UB’s fickleness—be it within or outside the overlapping realms of his mental disorders. And since she was the only of us four to use the place[1], over the years she was the only one who had had to tangle with UB over expenses and upkeep. Based on her many frustrating exchanges with UB over matters relating to the Connecticut property, Nina had the best understanding of “the world according to Bruce.”
But apart from trying to save Hamburg for Nina to enjoy, for whom (if not Mother), I wondered, and to what purpose, had I expended so much time and energy? For my generation and the next, Mother’s elusive inheritance had become a tedious abstraction.
That left Cliff, who by his sacrifices of time, effort, and money deserved compensation. Yet, he’d made his own choices. He’d been under no obligation to serve as UB’s de facto guardian. He’d allowed himself to be sucked into the unenviable position he’d now occupied for some years.
I felt tortured by the irony that the person who cared the most and had done the most about setting things straight, pursing the right thing, protecting UB from himself—kicking and screaming—and preserving our family legacy wasn’t an heir, not even a distant relative but by happenstance a tenant of the dilapidated warehouses at Park Avenue and Highland Cross in Rutherford, New Jersey.
Of course, Cliff was Cliff, and unless a person knew the whole story, which only I—and by highly abridged dribs and drabs, my sisters—knew, a person could never appreciate that Cliff was an angel masquerading as a human being. But angels had wings and could escape any time they chose. He had a thriving business to which he dedicated heart and soul, sweat and smarts. To outsiders he was defined by his enterprise, his reputation as an entertainment producer extraordinaire. At any time, he could announce he’d had enough, flap his wings, and fly straight out of the picture.[2] If he deserved in compensation a share of what UB was sending recklessly to London two, three times a week, Cliff wasn’t demanding recompense or even expecting it—especially after I’d joked with him about UB’s “will.”
As I tilted back the water glass to take a sip, I saw through the bottom blurred images of my parents. Their heads were well above the waterline, but I felt myself sinking into a deep funk awash in quixotic effort that now seemed to lack a convincing purpose.
I hid my feelings in small talk to close out the visit and bade good-bye. On the way home, I tried to rescue myself by the ring buoy of positive thoughts: on that day, at least, Mother and Dad were in great shape; sharp, self-reliant and taking good care of themselves in their own home—the polar opposite of UB. In defiance of Mother’s mental disorders, at least Dad had rescued her from UB’s fate of being buried alive in his own trash. Dad ran a sane, tight and tidy ship, took good care of himself, and would surely remain at the helm for years to come.
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© 2023 by Eric Nilsson
[1] For many years, Nina had used Hamburg as a summer weekend retreat from her home in Newton Highlands outside of Boston, about a two-hour drive away.
[2] Over the years Cliff made no secret to me, however, that the nature and location of the property was ideal for his business, given his growing inventory of street rides, concession booths, and other elements of his ever-expanding entertainment productions in surrounding communities. Ever the creative entrepreneur, Cliff had optimally leveraged the advantages of his Rutherford location.
