Dear Annie Column: Dying Man Wants to Thank Those Who Shared His Life
DEAR ANNIE: I have had the pleasure of enjoying a good life. I have served my community. I have a beautiful wife, loving children and many friends. However, it now appears that the illness that has been dormant in the past years has now progressed, and soon my time will end. I have accepted my impending doom as best one can, and let few people know of it.
I would like to thank all the wonderful people who have impacted meaningful parts of my life over the years, and I'm wondering how that might be accomplished. I do not want to make them upset or receive condolences from them. I simply want them to be aware they were a key part of my life for which I am truly grateful.
I considered a small gathering, but wondered if that might seem dark and morbid. Letters seem too distant, and phone calls would be hard on me.
While my death sentence is not going away, and it will be sometime soon, the exact date is impossible to find out. Very few of these people are aware that I am seriously ill, although I have been hospitalized many times.
Can you give me some suggestions to show my appreciation?
- D from Virginia
The Mailman
I have known the Henson’s since 1962. You see, I was their mailman. I remember the first time I saw them because they were so in love. I only got glimpses of their relationship for minutes at a time when I would walk up to their front step and leave their mail.
During these instances, I saw them painting the porch together, both of them with paint streaks on their shirts and noses. I witnessed them planting new flowers in their garden with dirt coming out of their ears, and I watched them dance in the rain to the faint sound of Aretha Franklin coming from inside the house.
Their first year at 2807 Levick Street, I saw them move furniture in and out of the house for weeks. First a blue couch, then a red one, and eventually they kept the yellow. I didn’t know this was the one they kept back then, but ever since the year following that one, now fifty something years later, I’ve been in and out of their house enough times to know that yellow stained couch is still a part of the family.
Their second year living in that house, I still didn’t know that much about them. I would deliver the mail to their doorstep and leave. Until one special Tuesday morning. I was making my rounds around the neighborhood and had just pulled up in front of Dean and Margaret’s driveway when she came sprinting out the front door and up to the side of my truck.
“Hi, hi.” She was wearing blue overalls, her cheeks were flushed, and she seemed out of breath.
“Good morning Mrs. Henson. How may I help you?”
“Good morning uh…”
“Frank.”
“Frank, yes. Please call me Maggie. Umm do you have a letter for me Frank?”
“I have a few, let’s see.”
“No, one in particular, it should be from my husband. Stamped from the army. He left last week and said I could expect letters from him on Tuesday’s.” She said losing her breath.
Immediately, I knew I didn’t have that one for her. Army letters came in yellow envelopes and the ones I had for this address were all white. I still took longer pretending to sift through them in hopes of giving her a few more seconds of comfort.
“Unfortunately, I don’t think I have anything from your husband yet, ma’am. My apologies.”
“No worries, Frank. It’s not your fault.”
I smiled at her and continued on my way.
Every Tuesday, I would come by the house and she’d be waiting for me like I was Santa Claus bringing her the brand new toy that had just come out. When I had a letter for her from Dean, she would be ecstatic. Jumping up and down and hugging me with every ounce of her being. When I didn’t, a tear would slide down her right cheek followed by a:
“No worries, Frank. It’s not your fault.”
Every time this happened, I wished I could hug her like she hugged me when she was happy, but I knew that wasn’t appropriate.
The Tuesday’s came and went, and every one we seemed to get closer. She was excited to see me and I was excited to see her. She was the brightest part of my week. Sometimes, when weeks had passed and no letter, I would sit with her for just a couple of minutes and listen to her talk about her day.
On one random Tuesday, she came out and said:
“Do you have a letter for me today? Also! Guess what?”
“No letter, and what Ms. Margaret?” I remember saying with a smile.
“Oh Frank, stop it. I’ve told you countless times to just call me Maggie.”
“Ok, Ms. Maggie. What am I guessing?”
“I need you to deliver this letter speedy fast to the post office, pretty please. And tell them it needs to go out way quicker than all the other ones I’ve given you. Okay?”
“Yes, Ms. Maggie.”
“Thank you Frank. Would you like to know what it says?”
“Oh no, Ms. Maggie. That is certainly none of my business.”
“I’m pregnant.” Her smile was so big and her eyes so filled with happiness that I can still remember it as if it were yesterday.
“Congratulations.”
“Yes, yes. Hence the letter. I’m finally telling Dean. I wanted to wait until the end of my second trimester but I think I’m ready for him to know.”
I’d been suspecting her pregnancy for quite some time now. She was definitely showing, but I figured it wasn’t a secret, just not something you discuss with the mailman.
“I’ll rush this out for you Ms. Maggie.”
“Thank you, Frank.” And she was already running back into the house but I stopped her.
“How would you like to come eat dinner with my wife and I tonight Ms. Maggie, you know? To celebrate.”
“Oh wow. I would love that, but why don’t you two come here instead. I can make some cherry pie. I always make it on Tuesday’s.”
“Sure, Ms. Maggie.”
And so Rosie and I went over and ate dinner with her that night and suddenly they were the best of friends. They would play cards together, go shopping together, basically do everything together. They were inseparable.
The letters between Maggie and Dean, came and went, with Maggie always waiting for me on the curb every Tuesday.
So it was strange, when one day I drove up and she wasn’t outside.
I knew it was none of my business but I walked up the porch steps and rang the doorbell. No answer. I rang two more times and didn’t hear anything so I walked around the back of the house to see if she was maybe watering the plants, and there she was.
Unconscious, on her back with her bowling ball of a belly under the weight of her body. I was a lanky boy with no upper body strength but I somehow managed to pick her up and get her to the hospital. And I waited.
They told me she’d be in surgery for a couple of hours but that the baby had been delivered and was doing well. It was a girl. And so I wrote my first letter to Dean.
Dear Mr. Henson,
In the past nine months, I have watched your wife fall more in love with you everyday that you’ve been gone. She’s laughed, she’s cried, and done everything in between, but it’s all been because of the immense spot in her heart that belongs to you. You see, I’m the one that delivers your letters to her on Tuesdays.
I don’t really know how to make this hurt any less for you, but today I found her unconscious watering the plants. I rushed her to the hospital and now your brand new baby girl is a part of this world. Mrs. Henson just came out of surgery and is in stable condition but I urge you to come home as soon as possible.
Your mailman.
I didn’t sign the letter with my name because I didn’t think it mattered, but I did put my address on it in case he felt inclined to write back with any news.
Dear Frank,
I know exactly who you are, as well as Rosie. Thank you for everything. I can hear my wife’s pain in missing me with every letter she writes, but it’s when either of your names are mentioned that I know she’s not completely alone. You see, we moved to Virginia in hopes of starting fresh, just the two of us. But when I got drafted, that only left her leaving her to feel half of a whole.
Thank you for informing me about what happened, but more than anything, thank you for being there to find her. I’m stuck here - no planes going back to the states this month. Please keep me updated on the health status of both my girls. It would make me feel better to know they’re being watched over by you and Rosie. I can’t wait to meet you both as well as my baby girl when I come back. I will make this up to you, I promise.
Thank you, your friend, Dean.
In the six months it took for him to come back, him and I exchanged letters. I told him about the football game results and who was in the running for mayor. I let Ms. Maggie give updates on her health and the baby because as soon as she recovered it wasn’t my place anymore. We developed a friendship, and I found in myself the same excitement Maggie felt every Tuesday.
Forty nine years ago, I stopped being a mailman. You see, Dean kept his promise. He came back and spent the rest of his life thanking me for taking care of his wife in the short year and a half that he was gone. He hired me to work for him at the cigarette factory, bought Rosie and I a blue couch to match their yellow, and had us over every Tuesday night for a barbecue in their backyard. He’s my best friend, the godfather of my own child, and the husband of my wife’s favorite person in the world, including me.
Today, I read the letter Dean wrote to your advice column, and my heart has shattered into a million pieces. He’s dying and wondering how he can thank those around him. So with that Annie I write you a personal letter in hopes that you can get back to me as well.
My question is simple, how do I make him realize it should be us thanking him?
