I can hear rain falling on the roof, splatting carelessly on the a/c unit outside my bedroom window. It is a messy storm, and it feels wrong. It should be snow. Christmas is looming in our hearts but it seems dimmer with the rain. The lights don't glitter in quite the same way. But even with the rain, my heart feels light. Today I will make bacon, and hot chocolate for the kids. The smell will wake them up and bring them down to me, and I will hold them and kiss them because they are mine.
I toss the covers off, reveling in that first brush of cool air on bare skin before slipping into robe and slippers. But for the rain, the house is quiet, and dark. The stillness in itself is thrilling. Normally at this time, we are all full throttle. Lunches, shoes, breakfast, homework, jackets, racing out the door. But the house is asleep and it is delicious.
Breakfast is everything I want it to be. My children drift in one by one. They snack on bacon, (how many? All of them...), and their eyes pop when I pour the hot chocolate (they're easily pleased). The smells fill us up, and we linger here in a toasty, warm cocoon. This is happiness. If I could bottle it up, I wouldn't for fear it would someday go stale and betray even the memory of this one. perfect. moment.
A few days ago, at my birthday dinner, Isaac told me he loves that I greet him each morning with a hug and a kiss. I cannot tell you how that made me feel, dear reader, because my heart is just too full with it.
Monday, December 22, 2014
Monday, June 9, 2014
This grief thing
It's been almost three months since my mother passed away. No. It's been almost three months since my mother died. You know, when I say it out loud, I have a hard time using the phrase "passed." I prefer died. Probably because all I feel is that she's gone. Some people say you feel the ones you love after they're gone. That they're watching, or that they check in. I haven't felt her. I don't feel her when I look at her pictures, or when I am in her home. I didn't feel her at my sister's wedding this past weekend. Nor did I feel her in the crowd, cheering for me with all her heart like I know she would have when I competed at the CrossFit Southwest Regionals the weekend before. I missed her.
I'm not really saying she isn't there, or that other people haven't felt her, either. Please understand me. I simply don't.
It's been three months. And although I can sometimes make it through a day without feeling that hole threatening to swallow me up, it still hurts. Today, I was talking on the phone with one of my dad's old acquaintances from years ago. He asked what my dad was up to these days, and then he asked about my mom. I told him she had passed away (I did actually say those words, oddly enough). And there was this kind of awkward silence on the other end, and then he told me he hadn't heard me. I repeated myself, and was surprised at how painful it was just to have to do that.
There are still times in the day that I miss her like a starving man misses food. And then there are times when I don't think of her at all. Funny how that happens. Funny how fickle the human heart.
I got a note from a neighbor tonight whose husband died earlier this year. He died of cancer. He was my age, and he left behind three little kids, the oldest of whom is nine. His wife told me how sorry she was about my mom. And she admitted how strange it is to deal with this "grief thing."
It would be surreal if it weren't actually just real.
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.
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.
Before I had to remember
It's a Monday night. The kitchen is clean, the dishwasher has finished running. For the first time today, the washer and dryer are still. The kids are in bed, with - more or less - clean faces and full bellies. Everything, it seems is as it should be, but my heart is restless. I feel off-balance. After running all day, the sudden quiet is unsettling.
More and more, these days, I feel as if I am chasing after nothing, but I am chasing it with all the intensity of a greyhound for a rabbit.
There's a part of me that knows I'm running from a few things, too. When I ask my mother how she's doing these days, she responds with something like, "I'm here!" or, "I'm alive!" And we all sigh a little bit, and cringe, too. Because the day is coming, and it is not likely too far off that she won't be.
I've never been very good at knowing how to respond to people in distress. I'm uncomfortable and awkward. I do alright with my own children, most of the time. But children are easy to comfort. It's been another matter altogether to see my mother's face crumple with vulnerability, and fear. We are all vulnerable in the face of death.
I watch my grandma, my mother's mother, and I am helplessly jealous that they had so much time together, mother and daughter. I grew up knowing my grandparents. I still enjoy seeing them frequently. Eli won't remember my mother, not really. He will have vague recollections of the way she is now. He won't remember how stunningly beautiful she was, or how full of life and energy. He will remember a swollen, broken shell of who she has always been to me.
I wrote the above post some time before my mom died. Not too long. The anticipation of losing her was horrible.
More and more, these days, I feel as if I am chasing after nothing, but I am chasing it with all the intensity of a greyhound for a rabbit.
There's a part of me that knows I'm running from a few things, too. When I ask my mother how she's doing these days, she responds with something like, "I'm here!" or, "I'm alive!" And we all sigh a little bit, and cringe, too. Because the day is coming, and it is not likely too far off that she won't be.
I've never been very good at knowing how to respond to people in distress. I'm uncomfortable and awkward. I do alright with my own children, most of the time. But children are easy to comfort. It's been another matter altogether to see my mother's face crumple with vulnerability, and fear. We are all vulnerable in the face of death.
I watch my grandma, my mother's mother, and I am helplessly jealous that they had so much time together, mother and daughter. I grew up knowing my grandparents. I still enjoy seeing them frequently. Eli won't remember my mother, not really. He will have vague recollections of the way she is now. He won't remember how stunningly beautiful she was, or how full of life and energy. He will remember a swollen, broken shell of who she has always been to me.
I wrote the above post some time before my mom died. Not too long. The anticipation of losing her was horrible.
Remembering pt. 1
This morning, I prepare to say my last goodbyes to my mother. Tonight, her family will come to her home to celebrate her life. They will come to the home where she died. A few nights ago, I listened to her take her last agonizing breaths. And tonight so many people will be in that intimate place. They will see the things she left, touch them, take some part of her with them to comfort their sorrows. There is a rational part of me that knows they need that. And there is a part of me that feels like we - my siblings, her parents and siblings, those who were there that night to let her go - are being invaded.
As her daughter, my experience of her death is different from her mother's, or her brothers', or sisters'. I wonder if it was any easier for her to leave than it is for us to let her go. She'd decided a couple weeks before she died that she would start taking morphine. The pain was unbearable, she said. And I think she knew that the morphine would allow her to go. She saw it as a way out. And we all supported her. But, even after she told us, she waited. She hesitated for days and days. Finally, she asked us to come and meet with her again. She told us she was starting the morphine, and this time it wasn't someday, she told us she was starting that night. I wasn't sitting where she could see my face, and I was glad for that. I was hurt, and surprised. Isn't it strange how we can know something is coming, know it, and still be blindsided when it finally comes?
The next morning, she was groggy. In and out, and mostly out, but still in a great deal of pain. I told her to not be stubborn, and we laughed. I told her it was ok to go, that my kids would be ok. I told her that I'm not like her, and she told me that I'm more like her than I know. Just as I was leaving, she grabbed my hand and asked if I'd be back later. I reassured her I would be, and she said she'd try to be there when I came back. I immediately told her not to do that, but that I would be back. "Love, love," I told her, and she replied, "Love more." And those were our last words to each other.
When I came back later that afternoon she was unconscious. Her lungs were filling up with fluid, and it made a gurgling, wheezing sound with each breath she took. I laid by her in bed, listening to her labored breaths on and off all afternoon. Her sister and brothers were there to give her the morphine and watch her vitals. My uncle Tom sat on the other side of her at one point and we told each other stories about Mom. One of the nurses had been rubbing peppermint oil on her temples for pain management, and the smell was in her hair. At one point I buried my face in her shoulder, and I could smell her again, not the oil, just her.
Wednesday, February 13, 2013
The Soulkeepers: a review
The Soulkeepers by G.P. ChingMy rating: 3 of 5 stars
This would be a low three-star rating in my opinion. I did finish reading it within a couple of days, so it wasn't horrible, especially for a YA novel. But, I agree with other reviewers in that overall it was a little clumsy. The idea of working out a story where elements of a Judo-Christian belief system become a literal reality (fallen angels, Adam and Eve etc.) can be interesting. I thought Susan Ee did really well with Angelfall. However, it didn't quite work for me in Soulkeepers. The character of Dr. Silva was especially unconvincing and flat. Not sure if I will continue reading this series.
View all my reviews
Tuesday, February 12, 2013
Pulling apart a pretzel
Have you ever had a day when all things stressful converge? Yes, I'm sure you have, reader. I'm sure we have all had those days. I have. I am today. But isn't it strange how each time it happens it feels new and overwhelming? Rationally, I should know (and I DO know somewhere) that the prospect of making dinner is a silly thing to fall apart over. I also know that all the things that are colliding right over my head right now will pass, or I will work them out, one by one. But right now, at 4:25 pm on a Tuesday, I'm feeling inadequate and small. Here is what I think is going on.
I'm stressed out about the Games. I've been training for this since July. And there are so many "shoulds" and "oughts" running through my brain right now that are heavier on my mind than any real physical weight. I've always struggled with those two particular concepts: should and ought. But the end result is that I can't be what I want to be with that perspective. Knowing that I am holding myself back is stressful as well. It's time to register for the Open that starts the first week of March and I'm just dragging my feet. I'd like my head to be on right before I take the plunge.
I'm stressed out about money. We had to fix our car (see my previous post on, among other things, the death of our Toyota) And today we got the bill. It ended up being even more than the mechanic initially told us it would cost - of course. Dealing with this latest financial crisis has opened my eyes in a dramatic way to how vulnerable we are. I've drawn up a detailed budget (for the millionth time) and made a plan with the Professor to rebuild and improve our safety net for the future. But it will take time. And getting the bill was a little like getting kicked in the stomach.
I'm stressed out about food. Out of everything on my mind today, this one is probably the trigger, and ironically it is the easiest to change. Most of you know that I follow a Paleo diet. I eat meat, veggies, fruit, some nuts and seeds. I have also gotten in the habit of indulging in diary and maybe a little more fruit than might be considered really healthy (I'm referring mostly to dried fruit). With the Games in mind, I decided to cut out the dairy and the dried fruit. I'm five days in. I'm still eating a lot, please don't think I'm at all in danger of starving myself. But I can tell I'm not getting quite what I'm used to getting, if that makes sense.
The whole ends up being greater than the sum of each of these parts. I'm all tied in knots, mentally, and physically. [deep breath, let out very slowly] Now instead of fixing dinner, I'm going to climb into bed and read a good book. For a few minutes, at least.
Love,
The Professor's Wife
I'm stressed out about the Games. I've been training for this since July. And there are so many "shoulds" and "oughts" running through my brain right now that are heavier on my mind than any real physical weight. I've always struggled with those two particular concepts: should and ought. But the end result is that I can't be what I want to be with that perspective. Knowing that I am holding myself back is stressful as well. It's time to register for the Open that starts the first week of March and I'm just dragging my feet. I'd like my head to be on right before I take the plunge.
I'm stressed out about money. We had to fix our car (see my previous post on, among other things, the death of our Toyota) And today we got the bill. It ended up being even more than the mechanic initially told us it would cost - of course. Dealing with this latest financial crisis has opened my eyes in a dramatic way to how vulnerable we are. I've drawn up a detailed budget (for the millionth time) and made a plan with the Professor to rebuild and improve our safety net for the future. But it will take time. And getting the bill was a little like getting kicked in the stomach.
I'm stressed out about food. Out of everything on my mind today, this one is probably the trigger, and ironically it is the easiest to change. Most of you know that I follow a Paleo diet. I eat meat, veggies, fruit, some nuts and seeds. I have also gotten in the habit of indulging in diary and maybe a little more fruit than might be considered really healthy (I'm referring mostly to dried fruit). With the Games in mind, I decided to cut out the dairy and the dried fruit. I'm five days in. I'm still eating a lot, please don't think I'm at all in danger of starving myself. But I can tell I'm not getting quite what I'm used to getting, if that makes sense.
The whole ends up being greater than the sum of each of these parts. I'm all tied in knots, mentally, and physically. [deep breath, let out very slowly] Now instead of fixing dinner, I'm going to climb into bed and read a good book. For a few minutes, at least.
Love,
The Professor's Wife
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)