I never would’ve guessed that I would be spending one month in Greece after the New Year. The holidays all came to a head on December 15th when we all gathered for the one year memorial service for my dad. It was a good marker and a check-in to see that we were all doing so well in the year since my father passed. We coasted right into Christmas and leaped right into the New Year. Actually, little Zoie and her mom Jana plunged into the new year. That is a polar plunge into Lake Michigan. There was a quick city break to Chicago for a few days between Christmas and the New Year where a moment of serendipity occurred when I ran into our old employee Corinne at Walgreens on State Street where we both had the same contact lens solution in our baskets. Old habits never change, so we sashayed to grab a quick drink on Rush Street. New Year’s Day also included one last twirl on the dance floor at Victor’s before this fine Milwaukee institution closed it’s doors on STDs, trips to the abortion clinic, mornings of regrets, walks of shame, and a respectable Friday Fish Fry forever.
On January 2nd my mom dropped Rosalia and I off at O’hare in Chicago and when she said her goodbyes to me she also said, “I think this is going to be a good year.” I remember immediately telling her that I wished she never said that out loud. Saying goodbye is hard enough. Why did she dare to say that after all that she’s been through? I love my mom, but I do not share her contagious optimism when it comes to life and love. I try to be humble and live my life as if everyday is the last because nobody knows what tomorrow is going to bring. I am more of a JKL (Just Keep Livin) kind of person.
New Year, New Me
We arrived back in Barcelona on January 2nd to a happy cat and dove right into the New Year. The epiphany was rapidly approaching on January 6th and we had a wedding to attend on January 8th. Perhaps, my mom was right about this year? I was going to the gym everyday and enjoying it. My approach to the gym this year was different. Instead of joining the desperate souls hitting the weights and the treadmills, I hit the pool. Two weeks into swimming I started to see the “New Year, New Me” people’s resolve dwindle and burnout like the Star of Bethlehem that lead the Three Kings to Jesus. I applied for my US passport to be renewed, my brother Niko dropped off my new brewing system to Kronos Shipping in Chicago and I found a battery for an old Seiko my brother George gave me for Christmas. The table was being set for a good year. Maybe mom was right?
The Call
My mom received the call on January 14th that her sister was in the hospital and that she was not doing well. Greeks by nature are hypochondriacs so it’s usually hard to gauge how sick someone really is. Because of the bond my mom has with her sister and how close they are, my mom knew she needed to go to Greece; which meant I needed to go to Greece too. Not knowing what lied ahead, George reserved her a flight for one month in Greece. She would be arriving January 22nd which meant that I needed to arrive before her to get the car, start the heat in the house, and make sure we had just enough supermarket stuff to get by for the first few days. I booked my flight straight to Ioannina with a one night stay in Athens. I stayed at an economical hotel near Monastiraki Square called the Hotel Attalos for fifty euros. It’s exactly what you would expect for the price: clean and inexpensive. I didn’t do too much in Athens except smash a few gyros, a tiropita, and some loukoumades.
Mom
Once my mom arrived in Ioannina the next day, we went straight to the hospital to see her sister. I stopped in the night before to sit with her, but did not ask too many questions because I found her in good spirits; in spite of everything. My aunt was so happy to see her sister and It wasn’t a tearful, overly dramatic reunion you would think that comes from a cancer diagnosis. That first visit was short and my mom would return every day after to be next to her sister. Every day my mom would arrive at the hospital to make her sister’s life incrementally better by small percentages that compounded into real results over the course of the next four weeks.
My aunt would get anxious if my mom left her side. I could see the physical, mental, and psychological toll this was taking on my mom; but, she never complained. As for the physical toll, my mom would turn her over and clean her and make sure her sister was in a dignified state at all times. Like the care for her husband a year before, there was no negotiating this. The doctors and nurses complimented my aunt on how nice she looked. I would drive my mom to the hospital every morning and pick her up every evening and I could see the exhaustion in her face. Every morning on the drive in to Ioannina, my mom would point out falcons sitting in trees and on the ride home in the evening she would scan the landscape for a fox or hare.
My mom was at the hospital every day to set the bar high for her sister and wouldn’t accept anything less. This perfectionism and exceptionalism was mentally draining on her. The psychological toll came from the other patients and their families that shared the room with my aunt. There was a common theme amongst them all in that petty family squabbles poured into that hospital room. Without any privacy, the squabbles and complaints became community knowledge. We weren’t immune to it as well, because we have the same family bullshit we can’t avoid either. My mom has an uncanny ability to squash it or walk out of a room if it starts up. This perfect trifecta persisted for four weeks straight; day in and day out. I’m surprised my mom didn’t open the door and jump off that balcony.
Me
While my mom’s role was to take care of her sister, my role was to take care of my mom. Winter in Epirus can be particularly brutal. It’s hard to communicate that Greece has a winter and it gets extremely cold up in the mountains to people that only think about sun drenched Greek Islands when Greece comes to mind. It takes some time for a house to heat up so for the first few nights I would fill up two hot water bottles and put them in her bed so she would be warm at night. In the morning, I would make her fresh squeezed orange juice to fight off the winter blues. It’s pretty wild to get 5kg of juice oranges for three euros on the side of the road in January. My whole purpose for being in Greece was to make sure my mom did not get sick and end up in a hospital bed next to her sister.
Beer
Last summer, we started brewing beer in the village. In my absence, my people brewed beer and it turned out to be excellent. Each subsequent batch of beer since the first batch has been better. While in the village I was able to brew a batch of a dark ale and enjoy the IPAs and blonde ales the guys made before I left last year. On sunny days (few and far between), I took hikes up in the mountains and did work outside the house.
Propane
The propane situation was getting dire. Every week I had to haul these heavy propane tanks up and down the stairs to make sure we had heat and hot water in the house. This was killing my back so we bought a super large propane tank and had it installed. It only took three weeks to get this scheduled. For Greece, three weeks can be viewed as an express service. Once that tank was installed, my back started resting easy. I could turn the heat up now and walk around the house in my underwear. Plus, this lifted morale for mom and me.
Ski
When I left Barcelona in January, Rosalia made a comment about all the ski gear in my suitcase. I told her, “listen lady! I’m going to get out skiing if I can!”. The only problem with skiing this winter is that there was no snow at Anilio Park. I followed the weather closely and once it snowed, I hurried back to the village after dropping my mom off in Ioannina and hit the slopes. Lift ticket + ski rental = 25 euros. Anilio park is not Chamonix or the Dolomites; but, it’s still a respectable ski hill on a mountain with some good runs. It took a few runs on the rope pull lifts to get my ski legs going. The chalet at Anilio Park is full of Greek people drinking coffee and hanging out looking like skiers, while the ski hill is pretty much empty of actual skiers. You won’t find the crowds of Kalavryta or Parnassos here. Ironically, I found the beer to be expensive at five euros a bottle. My goal is to ski here one day with every one of my nieces and nephews for the thrill and experience of skiing on a mountain where my father tended to the family flock of sheep.
Goodbye
If there is anything I’ve learned from death is that nobody knows when it’s coming to take you away. By dumb luck, one month in Greece was enough for this to happen. My mom was getting anxious as the days to return to the US were getting closer and she didn’t want to make the decision to leave. My aunt finally succumbed to cancer in the early morning hours of February 15th. The day before we brought in sweets for Valentine’s Day to lift some spirits in our communal space and say thanks to the doctors and nurses for all they do. Unfortunately, my mom was not with her sister the evening she passed. My aunt became non verbal in the previous days and was stuck somewhere between this world and the other.
The last order of business was saying, “Goodbye!”. On the morning of the funeral I had to go to Metsovo at 8:00am with my mom to get the death certificate so the funeral could proceed. The whole ordeal took an hour for the noon funeral. The moment I got my mom back to the house, she completely checked out. I let her sleep until fifteen minutes before the funeral when I woke her up and told her that we needed to go. It was a wonderful send off with a nice reception that followed. It allowed my mom the opportunity to catch up with many of her cousins she hasn’t seen in years. We went back to the house and my mom went back into hibernation. She was done with everything and I could tell the only emotion she had left was relief and the only thought she had in her head was going home. I felt the same as her, because I wanted to get back to Barcelona.
From Death To Life
The day after the funeral we cleaned up the house and prepared to shut it all down. There was some last minute shopping for Loukoumia from Belogiannnis (obviously the best in all of Greece) and a few odds and ends. On Tuesday morning, we took a flight to Athens to spend the remaining three nights together away from it all. We dropped our luggage at the luggage storage in the Athens airport and took just enough change of clothes for the short stay so we didn’t need to haul luggage all around town. It’s totally worth paying thirty nine euros for two bags for three days. While waiting for the metro to arrive, I spotted a gang of pickpockets looking for an easy mark. Now that I’ve been a victim, I can spot them a mile away and I told my mom to watch out for them. They’re dressed like tourists but they don’t have any luggage with them and they don’t really look like they’re hip to paying luggage storage fees.
Patsa
This trip to Athens allowed me to redeem myself from the summer. My mom wanted Patsa while we were in Athens. This magical elixir is found in the Athens Central Market at Oinomageireio Epirus, but it was closed for the week in August we were together last in Athens. What is patsa? It’s not pasta mispelled and it’s absolutely delicious is all you need to know. If it’s good enough for Anthony Bourdain, it’s good enough for you in all its gelatinous glory. We stopped to get some earrings for the grandkids, some Greek coffee from Mokka for the people back home, some nostalgic Greek candies (astakos or little lobsters) for the house, and some tea on Evripidou street that we returned the next day to buy some more.
After a few walks around Athens and tying up some loose ends with some Greek bureaucracy BS, my mom was able to get some much needed rest ahead of her flight back to the states. I met up with Damian in Athens before he shoved off to Ikaria. We went to Vrysaki for a drink and hoofed it through Plaka. We met up the next day in Omonoia and went for lunch at a taverna. This gave us an opportunity to casually talk through the direction Brave New Media is going this year against the backdrop of the ever changing business landscape.
Bon Voyage
I took my mom for one last bowl of patsa to settle her stomach for the long flight home. Actually, we both used that as an excuse to go again. For my Bon Voyage, I told my mom to go back to the states and get back to living her life again. She basically said the same to me with instructions to give a kiss and a squeeze to Rosalia and her mom when I get back to Barcelona. We shook on it and I took her to the airport and said goodbye knowing that she’s going to be just fine. The moral of the story after one month in Greece is the importance to remind yourself to appreciate every day as a gift. I’m going to cheerish this bittersweet one month in Greece we spent together and look forward to seeing her again under much happier circumstances.
