Cape On, Ready to Go
My husband’s cousin Larry is 88, colorful, fanciful, delusional and gay. He came into my life about two years into our marriage when my mother-in-law died. A long, well written letter arrived addressed to my husband from Larry expressing his condolences and memories. I loved it and asked about him.
He lived in Milwaukee, had a doctorate from Marquette, had been an administrator there and was gay. All this information was given to me with the same weight. I asked my husband if he cared that Larry was gay.
“No, why should I? He’s just Larry. I have loved him since we were little. He’s my cousin. I didn’t like his boyfriend much the one time I met him, but to each their own.”
I suggested my husband reply to this letter and he had no interest, but the communicator in me felt it deserved attention, so I wrote back in my husband’s voice. I thanked him and commented on some memories and added a few more. Within days I had a response. It was over two pages long and intrigued me. Again my “husband” wrote back and in what seemed the blink of an eye another response boomeranged into the mailbox. This was not sustainable, so I confessed in the next letter that I was interested in continuing the conversation. Thus, began what I call the Larry Chronicles.
They were wide ranging and full of current events and family history. Larry had given up a life as a dancer to pursue his doctorate at Marquette. He had danced in the chorus at Fazio’s on Fifth in Milwaukee when we were living there in the 1950s. It was a club belonging to friends of my parents. He loved dance and I was saddened to find out that had he attended our wedding he would have performed the tarantella in our honor. Oh, to have seen that.
We went to Milwaukee on a trip and spent time with this cousin. He was garrulous and witty and charming. His life was becoming smaller as he was working at Marshall Fields in men’s clothing and his savings were dwindling. His partner had died about five or six years earlier and he had been forced to sell their home. He had invested unwisely in tech stocks and lost most of his nest egg, but he continued on, doting on his great-nephews in South Bend and keeping friends amused.
About twelve years ago he admitted defeat and moved back to Mishawaka, Indiana into section 8 housing. It was a high rise apartment with a water view, but beneath his standards. His now emails were filled with poor health and disappointment in friends and family. He began writing for the local paper telling stories of the early days of the Italian community in South Bend. His stories annoyed the local relatives, but they were breezy and entertaining to the rest of us. We were helping him out financially and I was working with a group of friends to keep him going.
He continued to regale us with tales of his early life. Going to the White House for Luci Banes Johnson’s wedding as Pat Nugent’s guest. Communicating with Margaret Hamilton, the Wicked Witch of the West in numerous letters over the years. He had a life of close encounters. He had come of age in an era that arrested homosexuals. He would also pretend to not be gay, giving me a list of women that he had dated over the years. When my husband had two grandsons announce they were gay, he was shocked and felt that there must be a “gay gene” on the Danish side of my husband’s family. I said we were pretty sure it was the Italian side.
As time went on his delusional or prevaricating personality took control. He would tell me one thing in an email and then something completely different in the next. When called out on it, he would become angry and unkind. When I would stop and think about his behavior, I realized it came from a life of hiding. A life of living in two worlds. The every man who worked in mortgage brokering and the gay man that was a DJ at the disco. The idea of that would break my heart and I would forgive him his imaginary world.
He had a car stolen from the parking lot of the apartment complex and I was working with a friend in Milwaukee to get enough money from friends so I could ship one of my mother’s cars to him, when I received an email excoriating me for my selfish, unkind ways. I had never done anything for him nor cared what happened to him. It was the straw that broke my need to rescue him. I wrote him back and let him know that I would no longer darken his door or emails. We would no longer send money each month since it seemed to upset him and wished him well. He replied with a long email that he was very sick with heart disease and would not be going back to his doctor and would most likely be dead within the month. It was his decision. I forwarded his email to everyone on his email list and asked them to look out for him as he appeared suicidal. His final email really let me have it. That was ten years ago.
His birthday was recently and it is a day he relishes with cards and gifts pouring in from friends. My husband’s brother and sister-in-law still support him. They stopped sending money a few years back as he has a predator at the apartments that takes his money and opens credit cards in his name. The local cousin was his Power of Attorney for a while, but the predator had him removed and for the past three years has controlled and bullied him. So, any gifts are in the form of food that is delivered as even gift cards were stolen.
This year they were getting the Omaha Steak delivery ready for his birthday when suddenly, he just disappeared. No emails, which are daily and can be voluminous. No phone calls answered. My sister-in-law was concerned but her fears were waved off by local relatives with the explanation he probably did not pay his cable bill. She went ahead with the order. Then his friend, Reg, sneaked into the high rise to check on him. You must be buzzed in and no one buzzed him in from Larry’s apartment. He followed someone in and went to Larry’s apartment. Knocked on the door and no answer. He called 911 and they went by the apartments and were told Larry had said he was going away for a few days. He has no car and no money. They never checked the apartment.
We spent the week worried about his location. Friends in Milwaukee were contacted and had not heard from him. Reg went to the Police on Sunday to start a missing person’s report. He had taken an old flip phone as it had some of Larry’s information on it. As he left the police station it rang. It was Adult Protective Services in San Bernadino, California. They had Larry. He had been left in a motel by his predator and girlfriend. No money, no phone, no access to his email as his passwords are all controlled by the predator. The only number he remembered was Reg’s old cell phone which he rarely turns on, but it was on Sunday.
California APS will work with Indiana APS to get him on a plane to get back home, but then what? He cannot go back to his apartment as the predator has keys and his mother lives down the hall. His social security check will hit on Wednesday and we are sure that it will be drained immediately by his traveling companions. Indiana APS told us that they have no jurisdiction and will await his return and his decision about his care.
I washed my hands of him long ago other than stamps at Christmas and in the summer to keep his correspondence going. However, the first thought I had in my head when reading he had thankfully been found alive in San Bernadino was to load up my husband and drive over and get him. I knew it was ridiculous, but my rescuer pilot light was lit and my cape was on and I was driving six hours to rescue a man that annoys me beyond measure. He was in need. He was family. The relatives in South Bend are fed up. Where will he go? What will become of him? Will his check be stolen? He’s afraid to fly. A fact I have carefully stored for over twenty years. How will he get there? Will he be frightened? Who will save him? Then I remembered it is not mine to do. The South Bend cousin is stepping back in to briefly to deal with Indiana protective services and somehow it will resolve without my superhero co-dependent ways. So, I have my assignment. More work on my subconscious hero complex. Here I come to save the day … only Mighty Mouse is not on her way.
