From the moment my mom died, I have been going 90 miles an hour. I kept believing if I went fast enough, the pain, the reality wouldn't catch up with me. I was wrong and last Sunday, it caught up with me. Hard, harsh, painful, real. I got up early that morning, I told myself I was going to church. I hadn't been in so long, I desired, needed, craved that connection. I got to the church and turned around. It didn't feel right. I started sobbing: big fat tears that I didn't try to wipe away. I drove and felt. I drove slowly, numbly, blindly. Once I got to where I was going, I realized my driving had had a purpose the whole time. I knew where I was going.
I got out of the car and collapsed on a mound of dirt and grass. I sobbed in a way I hadn't since the early morning I came home to an empty house alone realizing in that moment, I no longer had a mother. I had just told her good-bye. I remember that night sitting in my car frozen. I could not, would not, go into that house alone and face what my mind could not accept. I remember calling Brett repeatedly, just needing to hear the voice of someone--someone sane, someone who cared, even if it was just breathing on the other end of the line as i sobbed. I only knew I needed so badly to be held. He never answered and I never got out of my car. I went and picked up my daughters. Dreading the moment I had to change their life. What mother ever wants to be the one to deliver such pain? I walked in to get them and they knew, even as they struggled to wake. I held them, they held me and I collapsed. I cried in a way that hurt.
And I did the same this past Sunday. I collapsed, gripped the head stone and sobbed and talked and prayed. I told her about my job and how I was finally, finally doing what I knew I was meant to do, one of the reasons I was meant to exist in this world. I told her about the pain of falling in love and being hurt, the mistakes that caused me to wake up and wonder who I had become and the choice to walk away from the strangeness and learn myself again. And I told her I was sorry. Over and over, I cried and said I was sorry. Sorry for unforgiveness and anger, sorry for not being there, thinking I had more time.
The last time i said good-bye to her, it was so she knew it was okay for her to go. How could I not? Where she was going was better than anything life here had to offer. I held her hand, I rubbed her face and said good-bye.
An hour passed, my eyes became dry. There was nothing left. But I felt peace. I held on a while longer to that cold stone, wishing, somehow, that it would be close enough to holding her. I pulled some weeds, straightened out some flowers, ran my hands over her name.
It still feels weird at times. My whole life has felt weird this past year. So many losses: a mother, a lover, a best friend, and for a while, myself. But I now have clarity and purpose. I shed a skin that was too tight and uncomfortable. I have learned from mistakes and grown.
Last Sunday, I felt closer to God than I have in a very long time. And it wasn't in a church and I didn't lay my problems at the foot of the cross. Instead, I remembered myself and my heart on a grassy mound in the middle of nowhere in front of a cold stone. And through my tears, I remembered a smile that comes from within.
I'll always miss her. Everyday. But last Sunday, I felt myself being held . . . finally. And knew, somehow, she was still with me.
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