Constance Pranger Taylor, 19 years oldNovember 17, 1940--Wedding Photo
I continue to make progress on all fronts, but it is so slow. This is not like when you are sick with the flu and one day feel markedly better. Every day when I wake up, I feel basically the same as the day before. I am aware of the fact that recovery is being made in very small incremental steps. It has been 8 months since a sore throat and all that has transpired since. Suffice it to say, this has been the longest year of my life. So much has happened to me personally and to those I care about the most. I just never imagined I would ever get something like cancer and all that goes with it. This is indeed a learning adventure. Diane and I are becoming knowledgeable about things we never imagined would concern us. They do now. I'm sure Michael Douglas and his family feel the same way.
While on my 7 a.m. walk today, my thoughts went to mothers. Yesterday Jennifer and Diane had a wonderful conversation. It was fun to watch Diane interact with Jen on the phone as they talked about what seemed like everything under the sun. Later in the day, Diane had a conversation with Gordon III and finally one with Ryan. It's no secret that Diane likes to talk, but she is also an extremely good listener. I feel very close to all 3 of my children, but my phone conversations with them tend to be more in the 5 minute range. In our family, and I'm sure all families are different, it is Diane with whom the kids seem to share the daily happenings in their lives. My kids know how I feel about them; I know how they feel about me. As I watch Diane interact with our kids, I realize how much I miss my mom.
I wrote about my mom in the winter 1995 edition of the Western News (Western Illinois University's alumni publication). I began my comments by writing "it had not been a very good year." The good news was that brother David was married to his college sweetheart on August 25, 1962. However, our family nightmare began the next day when the doctor called to say the results were positive--Connie Taylor had tuberculosis. Our lives were to be changed forever. David returned to classes at Western Illinois University and the rest of us struggled along in Hinsdale--my dad, brothers Douglas 11 and Greg 5 and myself 16.
When a person goes to a TB sanitarium, one stays there until recovery or death. None of us had ever experienced life without Mom. She cooked our meals, did the laundry, kept an immaculate home, nurtured us all, and did a thousand other things Moms do that none of us think much about. I was the logical choice to fill in around the house including meal preparations; we almost starved. I reluctantly became Mr. Mom as I dusted, vacuumed, changed beds, washed dishes, cleaned toilets, and attended high school. For the first time in my life, I realized all the things moms do every day for which they receive no recognition, nor do they expect any. It's just what they did in the fifties. There is a huge emptiness when Moms are not around as they are the glue that holds most families together.
Doug and Greg were not allowed to visit Mom inside the sanitarium due to the highly contagious nature of TB and the fact that they were under 16 years of age. One of my duties was to twice weekly pack up my younger siblings and drive them to a location about 50 yards from a window outside Mom's room, and then run inside and escort her to that same window so she could wave to her youngest sons. It was awful. It was the best we could do.
Mom never gave up. She told us she would get well and soon we'd all be together. Mom always had a brave smile, but I think we all knew better. Over the next year, Mom's condition did not improve. She had major surgery and lost all of one lung and part of another. We all coped as best we could but there was always an empty chair at the kitchen table. No one ever really complained. We boys just wanted our mom back and Dad his beloved Connie.
I was not exactly an imposing physical specimen as a young lad; I was skinny, had buck teeth, and plenty of pimples. You wouldn't know it if you talked to Connie Taylor. She acted like I was Tab Hunter or Troy Donahue. She was fiercely proud and protective of her four sons. We all knew this when growing up--Mom was a real looker. David and I took great pleasure when our friends would come to 27 South Bruner and inquire about our "good looking sister." It was always fun to look at their expressions when we told them she was our mom. However, TB took that away from her, and at the end, she looked like a tired Judy Garland.
