Now What? Rest In Peace, John Prine, Scott Carleton, and Pat Kerner

John Prine image source

“Prine’s stuff is pure Proustian existentialism. Midwestern mind trips to the nth degree.” --Bob Dylan, NYT obituary

"After graduating from high school, he worked for the Post Office...In and around his hometown, composing songs in his head. 'I always likened the mail route to a library with no books,' he wrote on his website. 'I passed the time each day making up these little ditties.'" --NYT obituary

“I guess what I always found funny was the human condition,” he told the British newspaper The Daily Telegraph in 2013. “There is a certain comedy and pathos to trouble and accidents.” --NYT obituary

“Sometimes, the best [songs] come together at the exact same time, and it takes about as long to write it as it does to sing it...They come along like a dream or something, and you just got to hurry up and respond to it, because if you mess around, the song is liable to pass you by.”  --NYT obituary

Rest in peace, John Prine.

Rest in peace, Scott Carleton.

Rest in peace, Patrick Kerner. 

I first heard about John Prine when I was my brother Pat’s caregiver. Caregiver's a loaded word. All my brother needed from me in the last few months of his life was to keep him comfy, which is a euphemism for making sure he had enough booze to remain loaded. That, and to keep him company so he wouldn't get too lonely. 

His fiancee, Sharon, had died of alcoholic-induced liver failure just a few weeks before Pat was diagnosed with the exact same thing, at age forty-nine. During the four months I cared for my brother, I turned forty. Too young for such shit. But we were used to it. We both grew up way too quick.

Eventually I could no longer care for him. I had a full-time job. I was the mom to a four-year-old. My husband saw how the emotional toll of caring for my brother was wearing me out. Pat went on hospice and moved in with our older brother, Jay, who cared for Pat until he died peacefully in his sleep on January 14, 2011. I got to help Pat smoke his last cigarette, a Camel unfiltered. 

Camel Unfiltered ad, 1974. Source.

Our last words to each other were this: 

"I love you."

When I was Pat's end-of-life primary caregiver, he'd occasionally ask me to drive him to his doctor’s appointments and pick him up some food, but mostly we just talked. My brother and I had a weird relationship. We were both, in our own way, the black sheep of Mom's flock of five lambs. Mom used to say, "You and Pat were both the best babies and the worst teenagers. Jay, Kitty, and Jenny were more of a handful when they were young, but relatively easy teenagers. But you and Pat were the opposite. So easy when you were young. Then you hit your teen years and watch out!" 

Pat was no saint. He hurt me badly when I was very little. He also, many more times than he ever hurt me, supported me in a way most people don't understand. We related to each other. I could talk to Pat easily about things I couldn't talk about with anyone else in our family without them trying to change the subject to something more pleasant. I don't blame them. It's hard to always wallow in shit.

I never could talk to Pat while he was alive about the horrible secret we kept. After he left this world, it suddenly became easy to talk to him about it. He's apologized. He's repented. I've forgiven him. He still loves me. I still love him.  

But I still don't like to talk about it with the rest of the world. I'll write about it. I'll even sing about it, even though I can't carry a tune. 

My husband Will and me, singing John Prine and Iris DeMint's song, "In Spite of Ourselves" at Pat's wake, July 2011 

That's the thing about art. It helps us express the unspeakable.

Pat was a raging alcoholic. A functional alcoholic, for the most part. He usually had a job and was only homeless a time or two. When he did have a job and a place to live, he often took in friends--he never knew a stranger--hit by hard times, because he'd been there. He understood. I never saw Pat shut the door on anyone asking for help.

Despite his good qualities, Pat was a drunk. He'd be the first to admit it. Sobriety sucks when you've lived a hard life like Pat did. He self-medicated, as many people who have survived trauma do. I'm not going to go into detail here about all the traumatic things Pat and I endured in childhood. I'll just say this. Hurt people hurt people. Our parents and grandparents and their parents and grandparents did the best they could under the circumstances. They fucked up a lot. They also, in their own way, loved us a lot. It's hard to understand. All I can do is learn from our foreparents' mistakes, growing myself into the best parent I can be under my own circumstances.

Pat once told me that he probably wouldn't have started drinking as much if pot was legal. He used to smoke--and sell--pot in the late Seventies/early Eighties, as a teenager into his early twenties. Then when he turned twenty-one, he found that it was cheaper, easier, and less criminal to buy booze and get a "real" job as a carpenter. His real jobs often required a drug test, so he had to quit smoking pot, but his bosses didn't care if he drank every evening, from the moment he clocked off til he passed out, and all day on the weekends.

It's the "what ifs" that get me. What if Pat hadn't suffered such early childhood trauma? What if our parents had taken him to the doctor for medication? A therapist to talk about his problems? What if our federal government had never put marijuana in the same category as heroin? What if Pat had survived and moved to Colorado? What if...What if...What iffff...fuck.

I can easily get stuck in the "what ifs." I feel better when I spend more time in the "now whats?"

Now what? We figure out a way to live this life we're given. Art, specifically writing and singing, helps me live my best life.

That's why I'm so sad, so furious, at the news that the world lost one of its best singer-songwriters yesterday. John Prine sang the songs we understood. Pat and Sharon. My husband and me. Even my mother-in-law and father-in-law, Pam and Scott Carleton. It's one of my greatest regrets that I never got a video recording of my in laws singing, "In Spite of Ourselves."  

Just as I learned about the song from my brother, Pat, my in laws learned about the song from me. They took the song and made it their own. They won first prize singing it at some festival I somehow didn't have time to attend. 

Scott and Pam Carleton, together in their home circa 2018.

I should have made the time. My dear father-in-law Scott died last August of lung cancer at the age of sixty-five. Way too young.

And now John Prine, the person who brought this song into our lives, has passed on. Way too young. It infuriates me. Our elders deserve better. John Prine's voice healed so many people, and yet, because of the inaction of too many of our leaders, he took his last breath alone. The lack of support, especially from our federal government, especially from President Trump himself is literally suffocating our national treasures.

I am sad.

I am furious.

I am alive.

Now what?

***

Update 4/9/20

I was wrong, thank God. 

View this post on Instagram

Our beloved John died yesterday evening at Vanderbilt Medical Center in Nashville TN. We have no words to describe the grief our family is experiencing at this time. John was the love of my life and adored by our sons Jody, Jack and Tommy, daughter in law Fanny, and by our grandchildren. John contracted Covid-19 and in spite of the incredible skill and care of his medical team at Vanderbilt he could not overcome the damage this virus inflicted on his body. I sat with John - who was deeply sedated- in the hours before he passed and will be forever grateful for that opportunity. My dearest wish is that people of all ages take this virus seriously and follow guidelines set by the CDC. We send our condolences and love to the thousands of other American families who are grieving the loss of loved ones at this time - and to so many other families across the world. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts for the outpouring of love we have received from family, friends, and fans all over the world. John will be so missed but he will continue to comfort us with his words and music and the gifts of kindness, humor and love he left for all of us to share. In lieu of flowers or gifts at this time we would ask that a donation be made to one of the following non profits: thistlefarms.org roomintheinn.org nashvillerescuemission.org

A post shared by Fiona💚 (@fprine) on Apr 8, 2020 at 8:04am PDT

Our dear John Prine did not die alone. I'm still furious he's gone, but it helps me in my grieving to know that at the very least he got to be with his wife at the end. So many other of our brothers and sisters who succumb to the virus die alone. I suspect that privilege protected Mr. Prine. We shouldn't have to be award-winning singer-songwriters to be at an advantage at the end of our lives. Amateur singers and everyday people should not die suffocating in silence. 

I'm grateful to the hospital staff that allowed Prine's wife to sit with him in his final hours. Maybe it wasn't privilege, but the fact that Fiona Prine had already been stricken by the virus, built up antibodies, and probably is now immune to it. I don't know. It's just speculation on my part. Whatever the reason, it's but one small silver lining on a fucking apocalyptic storm cloud.