As a Person Thinketh, From the Payne Street Collection
I was seventeen when my Mom died. She was only forty, but her body was already decrepit. She lived in emotional and physical agony for the last 3,650 days of her life. Over the last couple of years, she lost her teeth and lived on room-temperature noodle soup, the only thing she could safely swallow. Her vocal cords were fried, and her once beautiful voice was harsh and forced. In the end, only a few dark brown strands of greasy hair remained on her balding head and hung scraggly across her grey, pale skin. At her last doctor appointment, he said she had the body and constitution of an eighty-something woman. She held on as long as she could.
Throughout the decade her addiction was pervasive, it robbed us of almost everything. To fund a fix, my Mom would sell virtually everything we had, drain our bank accounts, steal the little money we earned as kids, borrow from close and distant relatives, and more. Of course, this is pretty standard procedure for addicts of any kind. But people never forget an outstanding debt. And at her funeral, almost no one showed up to pay their respects.
After the funeral, we started a swift process of cleaning out her things. My Mom didn't leave much behind — just a few clothes that smelled of stale cigarette smoke and grime, a few spiral notebooks of her thoughts from her time away in various halfway houses, and a little yellow book. I kept the book. At least it's something. Over the years, the little yellow book traveled with me from place to place, state to state, in a box with a few other things I'd eventually look through. But, over time, I forgot what was in there. And then, one day, many years later, I opened the box ready to "Marie Kondo" it, and found the little yellow book at the bottom. At first glance, the book was unremarkable, about the size of a postcard, and had messy handwriting all over the front and inside cover. It was titled As a Man Thinketh by James Allen. First published in 1903, the book deals with the power of thought and how by simply changing our thoughts, we can completely change the trajectory of our life. On the cover, in blue ballpoint pen handwriting I recognized as my Mom's, she scratched out the word "Man" in "As a Man Thinketh." And in its place, she scribbled the word "Person." And so, the new title of the little yellow book reads "As a Person Thinketh." I like that she did that. That's something I would do. Why should only men have the advantage of exponential personal power and the benefit of a pocket-sized guide to limitless potential through thought? She taught me that. Imagine that such a powerful lesson could be taught by someone the world sees as a throwaway person. On the inside cover of the little yellow book was a greeting in unfamiliar cursive, which reads, "To Cheryl, you always tried." Finally, someone along the way saw past her addiction, recognized her beauty, and tried to help. A small book with big meaning. And she didn't throw it away or sell it for pennies. Instead, she kept it close to her until she died.
From that moment on, the little yellow book with a new title was no longer relegated to the bottom of a bin and had a rightful place alongside all of my other important books. The old book with a junkie's inspired scribbles reminds me often that changing a story is as easy as scratching out an old title and giving it a new name. I can think it, write it, and it will be so. I can also finish the stories of people who died too soon and write an ending they’d be proud of. I think it’s profound that a person who left almost nothing good behind could leave so much good behind.
