June 2015 was the debut of the Apple watch. A number of my friends - who know my aficionado for watches and having the latest technological gadets - texted me, tagged me in Facebook and Instagram posts, inquiring as to when I would be getting my Apple watch. I was like, "What the heck?! I'm not getting an Apple watch!"
Fast forward to November 2015. For the first time since June 2015, the Apple watch came back up for me. This time it came in the form of my intuition - my gut was telling me to get an Apple watch. I remember making a "WTF?" face and shaking my head. Where was this coming from??? I didn't want an Apple watch. I didn't think it was worth the price tag at the time. But my intuition just wouldn't let go. Kept bugging me, "Get the Apple watch!"
My mom came to mind as I had a flashback to a conversation we had decades earlier. She was telling me that we all have this "little voice inside of us" but it feels more like it's coming from the gut. "That's called your intuition - your gut feeling. Listen to it, Erin, because 99.9999% of the time, it's right."
I ended up listening to my gut. Got the watch. Not really understanding why I did.
December 2015, January 2016, February 2016, March 2016.... I still couldn't figure out why I needed to get this watch?
April 18, 2016 is why I got the watch.
I was sitting in a department meeting, in which we were interviewing a finalist for a faculty position, when my Apple watch starts blowing up. It wouldn't stop vibrating - one notification right after the next. I was utterly confused because my partner at the time was also a member of the same department and she was sitting a few chairs in front of me so I knew the messages were not from her. Who else would be sending me so many consecutive messages?!
That's when my heart sunk. My gut told me it was about my mom. I raised my arm and looked at my watch. It was my sister-in-law, Mary, texting me. I can't remember, verbatim, what was texted but I do remember it was something along the lines of:
"Erin"
"Your mom is not doing well."
"You need to come now."
"She had a blood clot."
"Hope you get this message."
"Come as soon as you can!!!"
At which point my whole body started shaking. I froze. I couldn't figure out what to do next as I didn't want to be rude and leave in the middle of an interview. Again, my gut told me to get the hell outta there and get to my mom's side as quickly as I could. So, I stood up, grabbed my blazer from the chair and ran out of the room.
I hopped into my Jeep and sped to the New York State Thruway, less than a few miles away. I would drive 90 mph the entire way down the Thruway, arriving to my mother's place shortly before 5pm. As soon as I walked in, I went right up to her and said, "Hey Ma, bud! What's going on? I know you're upset about Donald Trump but I didn't realize you were *that* upset?!" She was laying in her hospital bed, on her side, and she shook her head and chuckled a bit then raised her arm towards me. I bent down and gave her a big hug and kiss. She was slipping in and out of consciousness but I had some time where we were able to look straight into each other's eyes and just hold each other closely. I kissed her again and again and kept telling her that I love her.
I had one hour with my mother before she slipped into unconsciousness at 6pm. My father, aunt, brothers, and I would sit vigil by her bedside throughout the night before she hopped onto her one-way flight to Heaven the next morning at 8:05am.
If I ignored my intuition back in November 2015 and had not purchased the Apple watch, chances are I would have missed that final hour of being able to converse with my mother before she closed her eyes for the last time.
Like my ma always said: Listen to your intuition, 99.999% of the time it is right. And, thank you Apple for making the watch - you gave me the gift of a final hour with my mother.
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