Editor's Note: I meant to publish this piece on Feb. 14, 2022. Due to a combination of work, extracurricular activities and, yes, procrastination, it wasn't ready. But let's read this as though I did publish four days ago.
By Jeff Guy
February 14, 2022. One year today since I lost my step-mom and my dad lost his wife.
When COVID was at its height, I thought maybe I’d been lucky. I’d seen so many people in my community come down with it and some died. Maybe my family was going to come away unscathed. Then one night last December I got a call from Marcia. She and Dad had tested positive for COVID.A few days later, they were both in the hospital.
Like the experts advised, we didn’t get together for Christmas, we figured we’d celebrate in the spring when the pandemic was under control. It wasn’t to be.
For maybe two minutes, I talked to my dad by Facetime while he was lying in a hospital bed, hooked up to machines and too weak to say anything. Age was against Dad and Marcia and I feared they wouldn’t survive. I was bracing myself for the inevitable.
But he was able to return home, and she had been moved from St. Luke’s Hospital in Kansas City and finally to a rehabilitation center in Wichita. The family was confident. It appeared they were both going to make it.
On a Saturday afternoon, Feb. 13, I got a call on my cell from Marcia’s number, but the ring only lasted a second. I hadn’t called or texted much when she was under medical care because I didn’t think she could handle it, but I called back. She had intended to text.
“I’ll be going home in a few weeks,” she said. As always, she asked about my kids. Her voice sounded old and feeble so after about two minutes, I said goodbye. I’d talk to her again when she was feeling healthier.
At around 7:30 a.m. the next morning, her son, Mike, my step-brother, called to say she had died that morning. It was a blood clot. Apparently, old people are especially vulnerable to blood clots after having COVID.
“I’m telling you, she was the best stepmom a guy could ever have,” I said to Mike. “I can’t say enough good things about her.”
I drove 65 miles north to Dad’s house in Beulah, Kan. Dad was sitting in his recliner next to Marcia’s chair and across the room from the TV, turned to CNN. The volume turned low. He was calm. Mostly shocked. We made a lot of small talk. Occasionally he’d say, “My life’s gonna change now” and “This was unexpected. I wasn’t prepared.” A few times I’d hear his voice crack and see him wipe his eyes with a Kleenex.
The day before, Marcia had called Turner’s Donuts in Beulah and ordered a box of donuts to be delivered to her 11-year-old grandson, Noah -- Mike and his wife, Amy’s son. She did this every week. The last box would arrive the following Tuesday.
Other family members came and left the house until it was just Dad and me. I had to get home and it appeared there was nothing else I could do. But I told him to call if he needed anything. He placed the palm of his hand outward and I took it. I didn’t know what to say or do.
I’d seen him come close to crying a few times and I saw him wipe away a few tears at his parents’ funerals, but that was all. “I love you, Dad,” I said calmly. The third time in my life I’d said that to him. “I love you too,” he said through tears. And I slowly walked away.
Life
She was born July 3, 1940 in her family home in Cainsville, Missouri, the first child born to Max and Lucile (Tanner) Collins. Originally, her parents were going to name her Lois. But her dad had been reading a book with a character named Marcia, which sounded pleasing to his ears, so the newborn was named Marcia Genevieve.
From the time she was a little girl, Marcia knew she wanted to be a nurse when she grew up. After graduating from Beulah High School in 1958, she attended Grossmont County School of Nursing (which has since merged with Grossmont Community College) and lived in the dorm. After graduation, she became an RN and worked at the local hospital.
She got married, had three kids and lived and worked in Topeka and Manhattan, taking some classes at K-State. When her boys, Bobby and Mike, were little and started playing baseball, she worked with them on catching and pitching. She was a member of the local Booster Club and served a term as P.T.A. president.
Marcia and Dad started dating in the early ‘80s. She was newly divorced and he’d been divorced for 8 or 10 years. They had vaguely known each other, going back to the ‘50s. Marcia said he beat all her boyfriends in drag racing.
My dad had a lot of girlfriends over the years, but I knew there was something different about Marcia before I even met her. Dad always mentioned her. It was like The Brady Bunch. Everything was Marcia, Marcia, Marcia.
Eventually, I guess they decided they could meet each other’s kids and the kids could meet each other. It was around Christmas time. She looked at my record albums. I had these cheesy Christmas albums by The Beach Boys and Kenny Rogers. Then she looked at Elvis Sings the Wonderful World of Christmas and said, “This one is the best.”
I found out she’d been a Presley fan since the early days when he scandalously shook his hips on national television. She’d been to an Elvis concert in the early ‘70s. These facts and her making French toast sealed the deal for me. I knew she was all right.
It seemed like the two families were always doing things together. Bowling. Playing miniature golf. Eating ice cream sundaes at Dairy Queen. So it was no surprise when Dad and Marcia got married. They were made for each other.
It wasn't easy for Marcia and Dad, blending their two families together, but, ultimately they made it work. They experienced a lot of stress & hardships over the years that I didn't understand when I was younger, but now I do and I'm able to empathize & respect them for the way they persevered in life.
They gave and gave and gave, sacrificing a lot for their kids, as well as their elderly parents, while dealing with jobs, money and all the other stresses of life. But it seemed Dad and Marcia got to enjoy life a little better in retirement and I felt they deserved every good thing they got.
“She thought about others before herself,” Dad said.
He remembered a school bus accident from a night around 25 years ago. It was cold and rainy outside, and the bus was carrying a basketball team. The accident happened on U.S. 77 between Douglass and Augusta. They heard the news on television, and Marcia, who wasn’t even on call, said, “I’m going to have to go in and help.” All the other nurses from the small hospital came in as well. There was a lot of teamwork. All the kids survived the wreck.
Marcia spent 43 years of her life caring for people as a nurse and it earned her a lot of respect from people. Nursing is what she was born to do. She was a professional in every sense & she appreciated the doctors, fellow nurses, CNAs and all the staff she worked with.
She was a sports mom & grandma, always running to kids' ball games, wrestling tournaments & any other activity we were involved in -- school plays, vocal music concerts, band concerts, talent shows...
Marcia was a devout Christian and church goer and she truly lived a life of Christian love. She was very kind to my siblings and me when our mother died. She reached out to make sure we were okay.
“I felt like she loved us as much as her own kids,” I said to Dad during a phone conversation.
“I know she did,” he said.
I’ve been having a lot more phone conversations with Dad in the past year. I’ve taken a more active role in his life and I’d like to think we’re both better for it. In the old days when I’d visit the folks, Marcia would talk to me more than he would. Doesn’t the old man like me? I’d think to myself. Now he talks non-stop when we’re hanging out or talking by phone. He’s had my back my whole life, helping me out of a million jams, but after all these years I think I’ve made a friend out of him.
Marcia would appreciate that. She was all about love. Heck, it was even her favorite word so maybe it’s fitting that she went to her eternal peace on Valentine’s Day.
We’re all a lot better off because she was on this earth. Dad, too. I used to both complain and joke about how the two of them, together, could give such long lectures. But even that’s an endearing memory now. Dad and Marcia – they made the world a lot better.
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