It was totally unexpected. I didn't mean to fall in love. I just couldn't help it.
I first met her while teaching night school in 1996. It was just about time to start my Quicken for Mac class so I checked the roster one more time to see if anyone was missing and sure enough, a "Cleo" was unaccounted for. I thought, Gee... that's an unusual name. I had heard of Cloie but never Cleo. I don't know why I associated that name as belonging to a senior citizen but an image of a white haired little old lady wondering the halls of the high school came to mind. I excused myself from the rest of the students and off into the bowels of the cavernous school I went, searching for this so called "Cleo."
It was 6:55 PM and no high school student in their right mind was at school. The frenzied stampede to temporary freedom had happened long ago. The click, click, click of my heals echoed throughout the desolate hall ways now. I went down the main hall towards the front door finding no one. I turned around and headed for the back entrance. The click, click, click, on the old asbestos tiles was all but deafening. I rounded the corner by the art room and there she was at the end of the hall near the back entrance just as I had pictured her in my mind.
As I walked toward her, she stopped, waiting for me to get there, click, click, click. Stopping toe to toe, I looked at her and said, "Are you Cleo?" A look of astonishment flashed across her face. "How did you know my name?" She said. I looked at her, smiled and said, "Follow me."
That was the start of a 15 year love affair. It didn't happen right away but grew as I taught her many things. Even though she was in her early 70's, she not only embraced technology, she thrived on it. Gobbling it up like a starving child yearning for more. And I gave her more teaching her how to use iTunes to purchase music and burn CD's for her husband. She even learned how to use iChat to video chat with her nephew whom lived far away. Nothing was too hard for her to learn. She upgraded her computer to the latest and greatest several times not wanting Technology to pass her by.
Then something unexpected happened. Not only was I teaching her, she was teaching me too. Cleo was not her real name, but a nick name for Cleopatra. Having been born in 1922, the world was fascinated with Egypt, it's mummies and Cleopatra, her name sake. In November that same year, they hit the gold mine in the discovery of King Tut's tomb. Can you imagine the pride of her parents when they showed off their precious little "Cleopatra" to the world?
As she grew, Cleopatra was not just any young lady, she was a Southern Belle. Born and raised in Southern Virginia with 6 siblings in a proud and prosperous family. She knew nothing of hunger or want during the depression having been spared it's terrible reach. It's not that they were rich, they just had enough. She met and married a soldier as most of her generation did in the 40's, then moved to Michigan where she prospered on her own.
Cleo was a woman ahead of her time. Working to become a secretary like everyone else just wouldn't do. She became a partner of a large corporation in the 60s which was unheard of at the time. What was also unheard of was that she was making a six figure salary. How'd she do it? Guts, determination and a mind sharper than a steal trap. When Cleo wanted something, you had better get out of her way. Her only disappointment in life was not being able to have children. Surviving breast cancer at an early age and becoming diabetic made it out of the question.
Getting on in years, Cleo decided it was time to sell out and move into a retirement community. This is when I met her. Still gutsy, determined and a mind sharper than a steal trap. I would tease her that I wanted to be like her when I grew up. Hell, I was in my 40s and I really did want to be like her. She was such an inspiration to all who met her.
I don't really know when I realized how much I loved her until one day when leaving, I said good by and added love you. I didn't even realize I had actually said it until it had already left my mouth and was hanging in mid air. She smiled and easily said, "I love you too." From then on, this was our normal departing salutation. In fact, it would become the last thing we would ever say to each other.
For the next 15 years, we would remain friends, sole mates, confidants, teachers and students in everything. On her 86th birthday, I drove 200 miles to bring her to my house and back for her birthday party just so she could see my flowers and gardens. No distance was too great to see her smile. Maybe we grew so close because she never had any children and I had lost my Mom to breast cancer in the year 2000. What ever the reason, it didn't matter. I treasured what we had.
Her 87th birthday was a different story. She had become very sick and had a reaction to her medication. This is when I started to notice a decline. A gradual slide down the slope of life. No, I told myself. Not my Cleopatra. I wasn't ready. Please God, give me more time.
The next year and a half would be filled with doctors, medications, and more trips to the emergency room. Even though the quality of her life was diminishing, Cleo still loved her Mac. Reminding her of what I had already taught her was now the norm. The steal trap was rusting and she hated it. I pretended not to notice out of respect for her dignity. Sliding, down, down, down the slope of life while I tried like a mad woman to hang on afraid to let her go.
Her last days were filled with pain and suffering. Congestive heart failure is not easy to watch. You basically drown in your own fluids. I was there, at her bedside. Driving 100 miles a day just to hold her hand to try and make her transition to the next world a little easier no matter how much it was killing me to watch. She was on her last journey and had to go on without me.
By her side at the hospital, I held her lifeless hand. She could no longer move and only spoke if severely disturbed uttering only three words, "Let me go!" I begged her not to go. I told her that I had planned on updating her Mac to Snow Leopard 10.6.6 so she could use the new Mac App Store. Her response, "Let me go!" As usual, when Cleo made up her mind to do something, you had better get out of her way.
Finally, after spending all day at the hospital trying to convince her to stay, I leaned over and said, "Ok, Cleo, I'll let you go." She responded, "Thank you." now only able to move her lips like a puppet, eyes no longer seeing things of this world. In between sobs, I told her a little about the other side and how beautiful it was and that her parents and all her brothers and sisters would be there waiting for her. I asked her if she had seen any of them yet. She responded, "Not quite." Crying like a baby now, tears streaming down my face dripping onto my hands, I asked her if she would come and visit me in my dreams. She said, "Absolutely." I leaned over, kissed her forehead and said, "I love you." "I love you too,"she said for the last time. My Cleopatra died three days later never uttering another word.
I am waiting for Cleo to visit me in my dreams. You know, that time just before you awake when you are neither here nor there but in that in between place where your spirits can touch. Cleo said she would. Absolutely! And when she makes up her mind to do something, you had better get out of her way. Loving Cleopatra was a gift. The greatest gift anyone could ever have and it belonged to me.
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Location:Michigan
