Bex Hall

Bex Hall > Memoir in Objects

Memoir in Objects

The piece of scrap plywood

From trash to treasure

Scrap artwork on the back porch.

It was an unwanted object, this 3’ x 6’ piece of unfinished plywood, a raw scrap destined to languish in the garage’s corner among the other project leftovers. But I saw a blank canvas.

It had been over a year since transplant surgery and improved health fueled newfound enthusiasm for creating. Nothing seemed off limits. Old furniture, terra cotta pots, the mailbox. Assorted types of paint and brushes accumulated and occupied spaces not meant for such things.

The project begins.

I set up a makeshift work area in the backyard and primed its surface. I started with a sunflower but it wasn’t what I wanted to paint. So why was I? Instead of abandoning the project, I gave myself a do-over.

Do over.

As I painted and blended a summer sky between sunset and night, I heard my grandmother’s voice, I love who I am when I make something beautiful.

That my husband liked the finished piece of scrap artwork enough to hang it on our back porch gave the dormant artist within a nudge to keep going.

This is the 38th story in the Objects as Waypoints Writing Project series.

The letter I wrote to a stranger

Photo by John Jennings via Unsplash

The day after my liver transplant, as the fog of anesthesia cleared, a cloud of deep sorrow settled in its place.

As days turned to weeks, I regained physical stability, but my emotions remained shaky. I wrestled with guilt and gratitude. Someone, somewhere had lost a loved one and because of this I got to live. I had survivor’s guilt.

During a counseling session, the therapist shared an interesting perspective.

She said, “This individual, either choosing beforehand to be a donor, or through the kindness of their family, gave a gift freely and without conditions. You, as the recipient of this gift of life and love, have only one response that could ever be enough. Live your life to the fullest, and love unconditionally, as someone did for you. That’s the only way you could ever respond properly to that gift.”

Her advice helped with my struggle, and I looked for ways to carry out just that.

A little over a year after my transplant, I felt like I finally had something more than the words “thank you” to convey, so I wrote and mailed the donor’s family a letter with my condolences and gratitude. And I closed with:

In honor of your loved one, my husband and I planted a memorial garden. It contains 400 spring bulbs and thousands of summer wildflower seeds in a 40’ x 4’ strip in our backyard. It should grow into a colorful tribute to your person who so selflessly gave me a second chance to live. — With all my love forever, Bex

The garden is and remains, a continuous cycle of life and love.

One morning in the gratitude garden.
Spring in the gratitude garden.

This is the 37th story in the Objects as Waypoints Writing Project series.

Photo of pen and note by John Jennings on Unsplash

The thing that’s not really an object

But I see it every day

Photo: Rodrigo Capuski via Getty Images
Mercedes logo shaped scar from liver transplant surgery.

October 22, 2014

As I was being wheeled into surgery for a liver transplant, the surgeon asked me what kind of scar I wanted. Confused, I asked him to clarify. He said he can make the incision in one of two ways. It was my choice. I could either have a Mercedes or a Lexus logo on my abdomen. I could choose my scar.

That’s positive thinking right there. That’s saying this wound will heal. And it did. It took some time. In fact, for many weeks, a small portion refused to mend. It became red and inflamed. I had to keep it clean and care for it to avoid infection. Turned out a stitch hadn’t dissolved properly and, like a burr under a saddle, it rankled and caused pain. Wouldn’t mend.

After the errant stitch disappeared, the wound fully healed. There’s no physical pain now, just a semblance of a Mercedes logo—a three-pointed star I see when I look in the mirror.

This is the 36th story in the Objects as Waypoints Writing Project series.

Photo: Rodrigo Capuski via Getty Images

The object I no longer have

but old photos prove it existed

A favorite piece of art that has since disappeared.

At 17 I was restless. The power struggles between me and my grandparents resulted in frequent screaming matches over what felt like unfair punishments and rules. I spent an inordinate amount of time confined to my room.

Fortunately, there was a large framed painting that hung on the wall. I spent hundreds of hours staring at it from my bed, willing myself to fly through its open window and sail out over the salty marsh into the clear blue yonder. The sunhat wrapped with a billowy scarf and the fresh picked flower resting on the sill spoke of a carefree existence I ached for.

If you leave here tonight, you will never be welcome here again are the last words I heard as I stormed out the front door with a handful of belongings. That was the night of my 18th birthday. Within the year, they forgave me, but instead of moving back home, I retrieved the rest of my things, including the oversized artwork I had to wrangle into the back of my Datsun B210.

I spent the next 16 years too often carelessly unkind and also often despairing. I remained restless and in every house, every relationship, the picture hung around. It whispered promises of escape. I tried for years to conform, to be the good mother, the good wife, the person others felt I should be. I wouldn’t admit I might need help. My remedy was to run, and that piece of art represented the freedom I desperately sought.

It was 1996, another move, another run. I don’t remember taking the picture down from the wall or packing it. That was the same year I finally said yes to counseling and began surrendering my attachment to running away. I began healing.

There are no photos I can find of the artwork and I have no memory of it in any house I lived post-1996. It disappeared around the same time my need to fly through its open window into the clear blue yonder faded away.

This is the 35th story in the Objects as Waypoints Writing Project series.

The guardian angel pin

The guardian angel pin and Dorothy Bryan’s obituary.

December 1988

On my lunch hour, I bundle up and head to a local gift shop nearby. I wait for the WALK sign to blink and then rush across the slushy street.

Inside the shop, attached to a lighted display, a sparkle gets my attention. It’s a tiny gold angel pin with a diamond embedded in one of its wings. This would be perfect for my grandmother for her Christmas stocking.

She had more than a passing interest in angelology. From the picture that hung in my childhood bedroom of two frightened toddlers about to walk across a rickety bridge over a canyon with a glorious angel protecting them on their journey, to the sagging shelves of books on the topic, she was well versed.

I had recently finished reading a book she gifted me, This Present Darkness, by Frank Peretti. It was an interesting story, but I wasn’t sure where I stood on the subject.

With the purchase in my coat pocket, I stand on the curb at the corner beside one other shopper and wait for the WALK signal. When it flashes, I lean forward, about to step off the curb, when the man standing to my right swings his left arm out and stops me. That same instant, a car that had turned right on red, that I had not seen, rushes by, inches in front of us, and splashes icy muck over our feet.

We hurry together across the street and as the the weight of the moment lightens, I thank the stranger. We reach the sidewalk and he responds with nothing but a tip of his hat and a smile. He turns and walks in the opposite direction. I watch him for a few minutes until the spell breaks and I notice how cold I am.

On Christmas Eve, I help Grandmother attach the pin to her blouse. She’s delighted with both the gift and the validation when I tell her the story about the stranger who kept me from potential harm.

2007

It’s been a year since Grandmother passed away. All that remains are boxes full of ephemera that need excavated and sorted. Keep or discard. The pin, its back missing, slips from between a stack of old bank statements and lands on my lap.

Since then, I’ve kept it pinned at the top of the cork board beside where I work. It looks down at me, keeping me safe.

This is the 34th story in the Objects as Waypoints Writing Project series.

My grandmother’s guardian angel, now mine.