You'll Be in My Heart

When I was little, I went through a phase of watching Tarzan all the time. I even learned one of the songs-- "You'll Be in My Heart" by Phil Collins. I learned the song at Mom's mostly, when we still lived in the apartment. My parents were already divorced by then.

Two years ago, November 17th, my dad found his sister Janelle's body in her garage, several days dead. It was suicide by carbon monoxide poisoning. I know this is an abrupt sentence here, but I've tried to place it elsewhere and this is the best place for it.

My Aunt Janelle, who was one of my dad's five older sisters, used to do Movie Nights with us, where we'd pick out movies we wanted to watch, and she'd take us to a store and we'd each (my brother and I-- brothers once Tommy and Sean were born) pick out 2-3 movies to watch and we'd buy them. We never really thought about it; we were really young and it had always been a tradition with us. Once a month we'd have movie night, and it was at Dad's every time. We went and bought movies and candy, then that night we'd stay up really late and watch all the movies we bought and, if we ate a good dinner, could eat the candy we picked out as well. Aunt Janelle had always had a good job and could always afford the movie nights. She'd done it at her own insistence.

Sometimes she'd have movies already bought when she came over. Once she had Tarzan with her, not knowing that we had it at Mom's. It's an easy mistake, with two very non-communicative households. I wasn't bothered, though. I was extremely happy about it, actually. I was so proud of myself for learning that song that as we were in the car (my brother wasn't with us for that trip; I don't know why) I sang it for her. I was really young and I didn't actually have the music behind me, so it was probably pretty bad, but she was proud of me, anyway.

Years later, once we'd moved too many times to count, we were in our second New Glarus house. I wasn't in the apartment anymore with Mom and I was a lot older. If I had to guess, I was probably eleven or twelve by this time. We were driving in her truck out to someplace (again, I don't remember where, but just where we were. I could drive the same route if I was there again, it's burned into my mind so vividly), and she told me that she'd found the song.

"Remember when you sang me that song from Tarzan?"

"Uhm... not really."

"Really? No? It was 'You'll Be in My Heart' by Phil Collins. Look, I got the tape for it."

Then she put it in the tape player. This was, I think, two trucks from the Hearse (as we've come to refer to her last truck, a maroon truck she bought brand new-- Ford, as usual. She used it to kill herself. My Aunt Erin went crazy again and when we went through the house for stuff left to us and things we wanted, she took the truck. Paid for it to get the battery charged and a new seat (since all the fluids and blood had drained out the back of her, as the days had settled the blood and begun decomposition in the truck itself) and took it up to International Falls, where I was born and she still lives. It's now in the hands of the husband of a friend of hers. Still driving around fully functional up there. I'm terrified that sometime when I'm up there, I'll see it rolling out of a driveway somewhere. I know I will, too. It was a good truck.

The introduction music started playing to the song and she turns to me at the stop sign and says, "Once you sang this to me. Now I'll sing it to you."

The words started and she sang along with the words. She had smoked for a really long time before this and probably didn't have a world class voice to begin with, so she wasn't perfect. And I, being the immature eleven year old I was, cringed. I didn't say anything, but I remember how I had such a childish reaction to it. It kind of makes me laugh at myself now, but I remember that moment in time.

That was the last time I heard that song until seven days ago.

My friend Teddy-- you probably know her as Hailey Prohaska-- made me a CD with 34 songs on it for Christmas. I got sick, so she didn't see me until two Mondays ago. Once I was healthy enough to not infect everyone else around me, I was out of that house. I went with Manda Martens to Teddy's house and got the CD's.

A few nights later, on Wednesday night, I was at my Dad's house. He lived in Beloit by then (a week ago). It was either very late or very early and I was listening to my iPod. I had uploaded Teddy's songs onto it the same night I got them, but hadn't listened to them since. I had opened the album with those songs on it and scrolled down without looking at the first few songs and put on a Hendrix song. The iPod was on shuffle. I was writing and not paying much attention to the music other than to calm me and focus me.

Then, suddenly, "You'll Be in My Heart" started playing. I didn't notice it at first, but toward the end of the song, I got stuck on a line in my story. I stopped writing and chewed on the end of the pencil and rolled over into a more comfortable position in the bed I was writing in. Then I heard the ending of the chorus of the song. I felt like I'd been jolted with electricity, the shock was so violent.

I just listened to the words. The chorus finished. There was a bit of an instrumental break and then the chorus played again. Then, facing my door and frozen mid-move over my story, the lyrics come clear-- they had been clear before, but these were crystal clear like bells, demanding me to pay attention.

The words were "Look over your shoulder. Just look over your shoulder." They repeated several times.

Slowly, though it was a bit ridiculous to follow the orders of a song from a Disney movie, I looked over my shoulder.

I jumped.

On my headboard, over my shoulder, was a picture of Aunt Janelle.

"You'll be here in my heart, no matter what they say. I'll be with you now and forever on. I'll be with you always. I'll be with you. I'll be there for you always. Always and always. Just look over your shoulder. Just look over your shoulder. Just look over your shoulder. I'll be there always."

Though she's been dead for over two years now, it was like she had found a way to say something to me, one last thing. It really felt like she was there saying that to me. It may sound ridiculous, it may sound crazy, but that's what it felt like.

"You'll Be in My Heart" has always been our song. It just happened that way, but even now, with her dead, it's managed to stay a song just between us.

Maybe it meant so much to me because she was my mother figure. I have never been close to my mom, even when my parents were together. Since they split up, I've been even further from her. Aunt Janelle filled that void. I'm glad I have some way to hold on to some bit of who she was. This song will always remind me of her. Even though it hurts to think about, I'm glad for it, in a weird way. That's all I had to say. It just struck me as something good for a blog.