A moment of grief (or anticipation)

I am sitting in the kindergarten carpool line when it hits me like a wave. This is familiar to me now, but as always, I am unprepared. I grip the steering wheel a little tighter and try to focus on the bumper in front of me. I turn my head, shield my face, hoping, knowing that no one cares about me in my little metal bubble. No one will see the tears that threaten to stream down my face. But Eli will soon be getting in the car. I may need to say a word or two to his teachers, as they smile brightly in a sea of bouncing, boisterous five year-olds. My face feels quivery. If I have to smile right now it will come off looking very wrong. Everything feels wrong.

I try taking deep breaths, and the car in front of me inches forward. Deep breaths aren't working, so I switch to shallow ones, that soon turn to gasps. I press my hands into my temples, and run them through my hair, suddenly restless like a cornered animal. I would run away from this if I could. I look out the window and see an older woman picking up her grandchild. Her hair is white, and she moves stiffly. Mom's hair will never be white. I want to scream. That will never be my mother. The words sear my brain. My vision goes blurry. Panic and rage rise like bile in my throat.

Some part of my brain goes through the checklist. The mothering questions that come so automatically to me when my own children are struggling. Have I eaten enough? Drunk enough? Did I get enough sleep? Was the workout this morning too much? But I am uninterested in the answers, even as that rational mothering part dutifully checks off each one. I am not physically ill, or tired, or hungry or thirsty. This is grief, this is grief, this is grief. And I hate it with every fiber in my trembling body.

Next, the fix-it part kicks in, and I wonder who I can call, email, or text that can talk me down? What pampering measure will make it all better? There are names that I consider, but there is no one right here, in my car, and even if there were I would hate their comforting words. Because there isn't anything that makes it better. And there is no pampering that will make this pain go away. This is grief, this is grief, this is grief.

I want to scream and cry and crawl into bed and shut the world out. But now Eli is climbing into the car, and I manage to smile, if a little weakly, and ask him how his day was. I wave to his teachers, and nod my head as my son tells me about this, and that. I don't hear much of it over the dull roar in my head. When he quiets, I explain I have a flute lesson to teach in a few minutes, and this is what I need him to do while I teach... I don't think he notices the catch in my voice. And we go on.

My mother is dying. In the last weeks my beautiful mother has become old, a shadow before my eyes. She won't be there for me or for my children and there isn't anything anyone can do, though they keep asking. Tonight, away from my children, I will let the dam burst. I will allow myself to feel lost, and helpless, and angry, and afraid. And mostly sad. I will let it wash over me, in a violent burst. If I am lucky, perhaps I will have a few days in between before it buries me again.