As Present as the Mountain: A Sudden Death. a Grieving Mother. and a Son's Loving Guide Through Grief from the Other Side.

By Ann Jackson O'Kane

A few days after his unexpected passing, I cried out to my son: “How am I supposed to go on without you?” Silently, he answered,
“Keep on bein’ my mom.” Thus began my journey from skepticism to knowledge, that life and love are eternal.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Balboa Press
• Release date: Jul 11, 2022
• ISBN: 9798765228791

Ann Jackson O'Kane

Ann O’Kane has written all her life, mostly on little scraps of paper. She spent some years floundering, finally doing what was necessary to teach, the work she was meant to do. A native of Seattle, Washington, she was raised in San Jose, California. She is an ordinary mother of an extraordinary son. This is her first book.

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ISBN: 979-8-7652-2878-4 (sc)

ISBN: 979-8-7652-2880-7 (hc)

ISBN: 979-8-7652-2879-1 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2022908566

Balboa Press rev. date: 07/11/2022

July 12, 2016

…you don’t see it now but part of the timing of my exit was to help others—mom, you don’t see it now, but your story, our story will help so many people. This is how I wrote my story to be…And now I wait for you to write your Story/our story when you are ready…I will never leave your side—ever.

For

Colin

Then, now and always

…and because this was your idea.

Losing Someone Who’s Been a Great Presence

It’s as if in Nepal you left your house to see the mountains

and Everest is gone – no – really, gone. Great clouds

pass by wondering. No place to lean on there.

What’s left is your memory of an immensity.

It stays with you, lives with you growing deeper,

stronger, taller – at last as present as the mountain.

From All the Marvelous Stuff: The Poetry of Nils Peterson

Table of Contents

Preface

Pay his toll.

Prologue

The World Ends

Chapter 1: Source of the Vow

Divorce, Creature Features, Saved, Sean

Chapter 2: Colin

School, Sports, Blink of an eye, Dreams

Chapter 3: That Summer

Tessa, Ceremonies, Genetics, Blessings

Chapter 4: Grief University: Freshman Year, 2016-2017

Keep on bein’ my mom.

Chapter 5: Grief University: Sophomore Year, 2017-2018

Which is stronger, your love or your grief?

Chapter 6: Grief University: Junior Year 2018-2019

Everything we were to each other, we still are.

Chapter 7: Grief University: Senior Year 2019-2020

Two endings and two beginnings.

Chapter 8: Onward

Bearing the Unbearable ,Selina, Anger

De Profundis, Hard Lessons

Epilogue

That was my answer.

Acknowledgments

Preface

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Pay his toll.

I’ve never believed in visions, certainly never had any that came true. Although I consider myself a spiritual person, I am fairly grounded in reality. In the past, I generally regarded most mysticism as fantasy or wishful thinking. Our son, Colin, moved home for a bit after graduating from college and a year of living with a couple of friends. He was happy, in love and working toward becoming a firefighter. He had passed a grueling physical endurance test and appeared to be in wonderful health, both physically and emotionally.

So, it was extremely jarring when, about three to six months before his unexpected passing, I would have—not a vision, but a fleeting image upon opening the doors to the garage or to the little unit where he lived in the backyard. The image was of him hanging. Obviously beyond disturbed, I shook it off, attributing it to my predilection for considering every horrible thing that could ever happen. After a sad and troubled youth, I determined that nothing would ever shock me again.

As a teen, a young adult, and certainly as a mother, I used to imagine worst-case scenarios and then do whatever was necessary to make sure they never happened. Take that, destiny, I thought, smugly. I got this. So, when these images flashed in my mind, I never wondered if they were premonitions or omens or something else. They were just my black thoughts. I’d admonish myself for this wild, dark imagination of mine, which sometimes warned me about getting too complacent in my happiness. Still, it was unlike me to envision such a terrible thing. I dismissed it as a recurring example of the black cloud that followed me in my youth. More about that later.

There aren’t too many unexplained things that have happened to me. But one quite profound occurrence about a year before Colin passed really stumped me. I shared it with my family and some friends, to try and make sense of it.

My mother lives a hundred miles from me, with a toll bridge between us. Prior to Covid-19, I made the journey about every other month, not often enough to use the prepaid FastPass. One day, I was driving to see my mom, and on the winding approach to the tollgate, I became confused by which lanes were for the FastPass drivers and which were cash only. Another driver apparently was confused also, and on the approach, cut in front of me, causing me to slam on my brakes. Hey! I hissed. I moved over to a cash only lane. The other driver decided that was the lane for him, too, and edged in front of me again. I moved to a shorter cash only line and the other driver moved also, behind me this time. Just before the toll booth, clearly, yet silently, the words Pay his toll came to the right side of my head. So clearly in fact, that alone in the car, I said aloud, I’m not gonna pay his toll—he cut me off!

Once again came the words: Pay his toll.

This time I thought to myself, Well, I only have this ten, and I might need the other five later. The entire exchange lasted only about ten seconds, and until I held the ten-dollar bill out the window, I did not know if I was going to do it. But I heard myself say, Guy behind me, too.

The toll-taker nodded and I drove on. It happened so fast that I did not have time to process it until I was driving over the bridge. What the heck just happened? I thought. Wondering where the directive came from, I noticed that I suddenly felt very happy. It seemed otherworldly, yet comfortable and calm. Over lunch, I recounted the story to my brother, David, and our mom. As I spoke, I realized I’d felt happy because I had done such a kind thing, as I was directed. They were amazed, as I am not prone to experiences like this. Wonderful, they said, …incredible. I told my husband, Sean, and some of my friends. It was clear that some other power was directing me. I do know the thought was not my own. I had been angry. And I’m not that good of a person. Considering it later, I knew it had been something Divine. I realized that I was being prepared to hear my beloved son give me the advice that would save me.

And as for the vision, it didn’t happen like that. But it happened.

Prologue

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The World Ends

The clocks are never right around here, I thought, walking back into my classroom after lunch. With one week left in the school year, exhaustion and emotions were high all around amongst kids, teachers—for sure—and administration. In a middle school, things can get especially dramatic, so I was grateful for the few minutes I had to myself before the bell rang. I picked up my phone to check the time. Instead, I saw a text message from my husband, Sean: Call me. I can’t wake up Colin.

I stared at my phone. Can’t wake him up, I thought. Our boy sleeps hard—just shake him. I felt an odd combination of blankness and doom as, trembling, I pressed the call button. Sean screamed, COME HOME!

I grabbed my purse and walked underwater back into the faculty lunch room, and without breathing, said, Sean can’t wake Colin up I have to go home. I turned and walked toward the parking lot. A teacher friend, Maria, ran up behind me and took my keys out of my hand. On autopilot, I said, It’s ok, I can drive.

No, she said, I will drive. Nearly hyperventilating and holding onto the dashboard of my car for support, I pointed the right-left-right directions for the interminable two-mile drive to my house, which is nestled at the end of a long, quiet cul-de-sac. As we paused to take that last left turn onto my street, a silent ambulance waited its turn at a red light. No sirens, I said. That’s either really good or really bad.

It was really bad.

It’s such a cliché to call it every parent’s worst nightmare. I remember little of that day and I am grateful to my brain for it. Maria pulled up across the street from my house, away from a fire engine and the other ambulance and urged, Go, go…

My front door was ajar. Sean was sitting on the couch in the family room, staring. A police officer leaned on the open patio door that leads to the backyard and the little cottage where our son lived that last year of his life. Words were spoken, but mercifully, my brain has blocked most memory. However, I do remember saying, He died? Maria had followed me into the house. I looked over to see her face crumpling in tears. I started to go into the backyard and the officer gently stopped me. No, he said, you don’t want to see him like that. Like what? I thought. Nothing registered. Sean had found him on the floor of the little cottage, clearly gone.

All that registered was the thought, repeating like a mantra: This cannot be happening. Disbelief, suffocating confusion, and indescribable pain coiled inside me in a sort of waking nightmare. Soon the principal and counselor of my school materialized in my family room. A police officer told me to go somewhere in the house where I wouldn’t see my boy taken out, carried on a stretcher across the back lawn where he once ran through the sprinkler and played with friends, past the bench where he posed for senior prom photos, and through the gate to the driveway where he parked his car, into another ambulance that wouldn’t need a siren.

On this afternoon, time is stopped. I float from room to room, looking around. My house is filled with people. A priest I’ve never seen before is spouting platitudes about God’s plan. There are uniformed strangers in my backyard. I’m so confused. Why are people eating? Where did these big pans of spaghetti and salad come from? How did my father get here? Why is Starr washing dishes? Someone is cleaning my bathroom. People are on their phones. People are crying. My teaching partner, Debbie is in my living room. She is silent, gently rocking herself, eyes red and wet.

The reason it’s a cliché to say that the death of your child is the worst thing that can happen is because it is true. It really is the worst thing that can happen, and that’s why—clever me—figured