Green, Yellow, Red.

One child dropped off; one to go.
Twelve minutes to get him there.
I see a police car nearby.
I watch my speed, mind my habits,
as all of us do when a police car is nearby.
I turn on my blinker. 
I change lanes.
The police car doesn't follow me.
Well, that's good to know. 
Maybe she's just prowling the area,
keeping us all safe.
She trails me for a couple of miles.
I'm watching the clock, watching my speed, watching traffic.
I know the pattern: I can only make the second light if I'm in the starting position at the first light. 
I'm two cars back. 
I probably won't make the next green light.
But I might.
The light turns green, and we all make the turn.
The next light is green,
then yellow,
I want to get my son to preschool, and
I slip under.
It turns red over my head.
Red and blue lights flash and spin behind me.
I pull into the middle lane -
maybe she needs around me to catch a real criminal.
She follows me.
Well, it looks like I am today's criminal.
"Ma'am, obviously I pulled you over for running that red light." 
"Yes, I see that.  I'm sorry about that."
"License, registration and proof of insurance, please."
I retrieve them all from the glove box.  Robb has taught me faithfully to keep them at my fingertips when driving (although I don't think Mr. Citizen of the Year ever needed to call upon them at a moment's notice).
"Ma'am, are your plates expired?"
I recall the sticker that came in the mail. 
"No, they're current."
"Well, your registration has expired.  This form expired in 2011."
(I wanted to say, and we are roughly 23 days into 2012.  Happy New Year.)
"Well, my insurance is up to date, but I think I forgot to put the new card in my car."
My husband always did that for me.
"Ma'am, your insurance card is expired as well, but I'm talking about your registration right now."
I can't really listen to what you're talking about right now.  Because all I can see is my husband handing me the new insurance card, four months before the old one expired, reminding me to keep both of them in the glove box, just in case.
Oh, how I drove him crazy with my carelessness about such things.  "Robb, it's February.  I don't need that until April."
"Tricia, put it in there, please.  Just... please." 
On day three of my forgetting, he would move it from the kitchen counter to my glove box. 
Just in case.
"Officer, my husband died one year ago.  This is a detail he took care of for me.  It, um, this one apparently slipped through the cracks.  I assure you - everything is current."
"Well, I will need to make sure of that.  Do you know that it is a summonsable offense to drive a car with an expired registration?  I take people to jail for this."
I could practically hear Tyler's eyebrows shoot through the ceiling as she walked back to her cruiser.
He was terrified.
He has one parent left, and this police officer just threatened to take me to jail.
I cried.
Not because of the threat,
not because of the pending ticket,
not because I was pulled over at all.
I cried because I missed my husband.
Tyler asked a million questions. 
"Mommy, why did she take your stuff with her? 
Where did she go?
Is she coming back?
Are you going to jail?
Am I going to school?
Why are you crying?
Are you crying because you're going to jail?"
I'm crying because this is the 'just in case' Robb tried to prepare me for.
The officer returned to my window.
"Ma'am, I called the DMV, and your registration is in fact current." 
(I told you it was.)  I nod.
"But that phone call is not my job, ma'am.  That's your job."
Add it to the list.  Everything is my job now.
"Ma'am, what were you thinking when you saw me behind you?"
"I was thinking, I need to get my son to preschool."
"Yes, but I saw you driving patterns change.  What were you thinking?  Were you thinking you could get away from me?  What were you thinking as you ran that red light?"
And now I am under an interrogation.
"I was thinking, I hope the light stays yellow so I can get my son to preschool."
"Ma'am, I am sorry for your loss --"
and before I can thank her, she continues --
"and I'm certain I don't need to explain to you how precious life is."
I look at her.  I wish I were not crying.
"Certainly, you, of all people, know how quickly things can change."
Certainly, I assure you that I do.
"Ma'am, drive more safely.  Don't run red lights just to get to preschool."
It was yellow.
And it was a mistake.
Add it to the list.

Not Every Mommy

"Mommy, who is your husband?"

"Daddy is."

Or, wait.  Daddy was.  Is.  Was.

Damn those verb tenses.

"Actually, I don't have a husband anymore.  But when Daddy was alive, he was my husband."

Yes, love conquers the grave. 

But on a questionnaire, 'Are you married or single?'  I'm single.  He was my husband.

"Do you think Poppa could be your husband, Mommy?"

"No, he's my dad."

"Do you think I could be your husband?"

"No, kiddo.  It just doesn't work that way." 

It's okay, buddy.  Not every mommy has one.

Luckiest

I'm sitting on a plane.  I'm flying back home.  Four days away is the perfect amount: I'm in love with my children again.  I can't wait to kiss their freckled faces.

Oh, God, I miss my husband. 

I turn on my iPod.  I listen to Ben Folds sing The Luckiest. 

He sings the same song to me. 
On repeat, as if he doesn't mind at all.
My mind is a stream of consciousness.

I cry and I cry and I cry.

I don't get many things right the first time.
In fact, I am told that a lot.
Now I know all the wrong turns
and stumbles and falls brought me here.
And where was I before the day
that I first saw your lovely face?
Now I see it everyday.

And I know,
that I am the luckiest.

I cry.

What if I'd been born fifty years before you
in a house on the street where you lived?
Maybe I'd be outside as you passed on your bike.
Would I know?
And in a wide sea of eyes
I see one pair that I recognize.
And I know,
that I am the luckiest.

I love you more than I have ever found the way to say to you.

In bold letters, I write on the airline napkin: WIDOW.
If anyone asks why I am weeping, I will not want to talk.
I'll just show them my napkin.
Let the napkin tell the story.

I look out the window, at the horizon line.  The plane soars above the clouds. 

I think of what so many think of heaven,
that it is just beyond the clouds.
And while I don't believe that's true,
I let my imagination wander as if it were.
If my seat in this airplane is at all closer to the man I love.

I cry, silently.  I don't make a sound.  I see my reflection in my laptop screen: my eyelashes are bare, my eyelids are puffy.  My lipgloss shines.

Tears spill.  I spill.  I have never realized the depth of the word sadness.  It's a warm, soft word.

Some friends attended a funeral this week, honoring the death of an old woman who had been ill and wheelchair-bound for more than two decades.  Her husband cared for her every single day, even when her illness stole everything but her smile.

At her funeral, he read a letter to her, and his closing words were, "You loved me enough to last me until I am one hundred.  But one day after that, I'm out of here."

Next door, there's an old man
who lived to his nineties
and one day
passed away in his sleep.
And his wife,
she stayed for a couple of days
and passed away.

I'm sorry -
I know that's a strange way to tell you
that I know we belong,

that I know,

that I am the luckiest.

Someone asked me this week, "Where is God in this?"

"He's in the fact that I'm breathing.  I'm alive."

She said, "Are you talking about all the life you've found in this, the writing, the blessings?  That kind of alive?"

"No.  I mean, I am alive.  I am breathing.  At all.  That's where God is in this."

My husband was a good man.  God, I miss him.

It was a good gig while we had it, babe.
I know . . . that I am the luckiest.

Forty Years

I am visiting my Arkansas girl this week.  She introduced me to Thera, a woman in her small town.  Thera is lovely, strong and spry.  Her eye makeup is flawless, and all of her seems to radiate in shades of lavender and soft blue.

Thera and I have heard of one another, prayed for one another, but we just met for the first time.

She and I are much the same.  Widows.  My husband died within days of hers. We've each just passed the first anniversary.  Our paths are very similar.

It's just that she's forty years older than me.

My hand fit nicely into hers as we chatted.  My skin is soft with moisturizer, hers is soft with life.

"I have thought of you so much this year," I told her.

"And I, you.  Except I think your journey is harder than mine."

"I'm not sure about that," I rebuttal.  I resist the measurement of one grief against another.

"I am sure.  You have two small children."

This I cannot disagree with.  It's true.  I do.

She says, "But, God says his way is perfect, and you can't get much better than that."

Her careful words rest well with me.  She isn't offering me a bandage for a broken heart.  She is offering me truth that seems safer since she has to lean on it as hard as I do.

"Yes, you're right.  You can't get much better than perfect.  But..." I pause.  I gather myself.  "Don't you just miss him sometimes?  Just plain miss him?"

Her eyes soften; we mirror one another.  Decades mean nothing.

"Oh, honey.  In our later years, I began to think about what my life would be like without him.  I knew he was going to die before me, and I had time to think about it.  But I never imagined the constant, cold, to my core, deep, deep ways that I miss him.  That doesn't go away, does it?"

"No,  I don't think it does."

Ketchup

The boys played at the McDonald's playland.  A family spread their Happy Meals across the table next to mine.  They keep pulling up chairs - there seem to be so many of them.

"Where is the ketchup?" the little boy asks.

"Mommy went to get some," his dad responds.

Mommy went to get some. 

Why did that sentence make my throat tighten and my eyes sting?

These drive by emotions don't catch me off guard quite so often, but suddenly I was nearly a mess.  Over someone else's mommy's ketchup.

I still can't make sense of it.

But I think it has something to do with the husband and wife working as a team. 
Something to do with him holding down the fort and passing out napkins while she covered one more detail.
Something to do with him knowing where she was.
Something to do with the fact that young parents call each other Mommy and Daddy.
Something to do with a family on a lunch date, instead of a mom in survival mode.
Something to do with a family intact.

I don't know.  But I cried over ketchup.

Loaded Word

I completed a registration card for Tyler.

Name.
Birthdate.
Age.
Grade.

But then they swept in with some left fielders at the bottom.

Does the child live with both parents?
If not, then with whom does the child live?
Why?  Please explain.

The child lives with one parent.
Me.
I am his mother.
My husband died one year ago.

(This was the first time I had written this sentence.)

I realized too late that such a question really only needs one answer: "Widow." 

Such a loaded word answers it all. 

There are no custody issues.
There isn't a divorce.
There was a death.
And now it's me.
He lives with me.

So many answers hidden in just one word.

Nothing to Filter

Bereavement and depression wear matching clothes, sometimes.  A good doctor can see the difference.  A good doctor can treat the depression and let the bereavement run its course.

A good doctor has the courage to say, "Yep.  That sounds about right.  What you're describing is normal.  There isn't a drug for that."

So the good news is that I am on track, I'm not regressing, and these hills and valleys are predictable on the invisible map.  The bad news is there is no way around this.

I think sadness is beautiful.  It's so pure.  There is nothing to filter - no anger, jealousy, deceit, insecurity, wrongful hurt.  There is simply sadness. 

It's a rare day when she travels alone, but the purity is worth the brief visit.

Handkerchief

Robb carried a handkerchief in his pocket.  He rarely needed it; it was largely for me.  He married a teary girl.

When I needed it, in church or in a movie, he had one handy for me.  I needed one recently.  (Tears are fresh and plentiful these days.)  I couldn't find it.  I groped blindly in my handbag, wishing upon wishes for something to dry these streams of mascara.

And then something prompted my mind to travel down a linear path:

I took it out of my purse when we traveled to Ohio,
I wanted it with me on the plane,
I put it in my red bag,
my computer is in my red bag,
my red bag is sitting at my feet in this coffee shop. 

I reached into the big pocket of the red bag.  Sure enough: the familiar, worn linen of his handkerchief, monogrammed in the bottom right corner.

It was as if he had handed it to me once more.

"Thanks, honey," I whispered, seemingly to myself, but not to myself really at all.

Dreamy or Dazed or Simply Absent

"Mommy, remember when you let us sleep with you sometimes when it's morning and you're not up yet?" asks the little voice standing beside my bed.

I answer without opening my eyes.  "Yes.  But it's too early, buddy.  I need my bed."

"But you let Daddy sleep with you."

"That was... different."

"Please, Mommy?  It's scary in there."

I hesitate, gauging my strength to fight this back-to-bed battle.

"Please, Mommy?  It's 7-2-1."  He reads the digital clock.  He knows if that first number isn't 7 or higher, he doesn't stand a chance.

"Okay.  You can."

"Yes?  Did you say yes?  You said yes?"

"I said yes."  And this inconsistency is no doubt why we continue to have this battle at all.

He climbs in.  His brother follows shortly behind.  I am sandwiched between a dozen knees and elbows.  There's really nothing settling about this way to start the day.  It's just so abrupt.

Tucker peels open my eyelid.  "Mommy, are you dead?"

"No, I'm not dead."

"Oh.  Because you looked like you were dead."

"I'm not."

They are leaning across me, arguing over something insanely important to them.

"Let's get up.  I'm making muffins."  I decide.

"But I don't like muffins."

"Then you can have a PopTart."

"I want two PopTarts."

"You never finish two.  You may have one."

They pause at the top of the stairs to question if the alarm is on.  They are like Pavlov's dogs: they know this trigger, and they are not about to step into the range of the motion sensor unless I can guarantee a controlled environment.

We make the muffins.  Half blueberry, half chocolate chip.  They help, which really means twice the prep time and twice the dishes.  But in the end, the offender decides he'll eat some after all.  But only the chocolate chips ones.

They play MarioKart while I pay a stack of bills.  I'm tired of receiving anything - anything - in Robb's name.  Extra points to anyone who has taken his name off our record in their system.

After much grumbling and complaining, losses and findings of mittens and gloves, we embark on the day.  First stop: the bank.  I need to get a page notarized, one more detail that involves a death certificate.

The woman behind the counter mistakes it for a marriage certificate.  Her eyes light up and she nearly congratulates me.  No.  It's not that.  It's the end.

She had almost been cordial, but now she's afraid to misstep.  So instead she becomes entirely procedural.  I want to scream inside the bank, stomp my feet and shout like a toddler wanting a lollipop. I want everyone to look and notice. I want to say, "Do you know that he mattered to me?  Do you know that he was more than a stack of paperwork and signatures?"

I cry in the car.  I do this a lot.

We have packed up their motor scooters, the Christmas gifts from their Chicago grandparents, Robb's mom and dad.  We find an empty parking lot, and they do their do.  Tucker with amazing balance and tricks, Tyler with careful and slow steadiness.

I take videos and I nickname them Speed Rocket and Blazing Flame.  They pretend they are in the circus, a team of daredevils.  I teach them how to ride with one leg elegantly extended behind, like a ballerina on wheels.  Only I don't use that analogy.

We have lunch.  They disobey.  They want root beer.  I give them apple juice.  There is kicking and bickering.

This day is going so slowly.

It is 12:10.  Arthur's Christmas begins at 12:20.  If we hurry, we can make it.  We hurry.  We make it.

(Assigned seating is stupid in a movie theater.  There's no reason for it, I say.  Especially when we have narrowly arrived before the movie starts, the lights are dimmed, the previews are rolling, my children are distracted by the silver screen, and I must diligently look for Row H, seats 3, 4, and 5.)

I bank on the hope that nobody else will arrive later than we do, and I claim three seats in the back row, tippy top.  (Hidden motive: if the movie gets too, you know, underwhelming, I can discreetly read the book in my bag.)  The boys and I settle in.

By the way, they have spent this day in costume: Spiderman and Optimus Prime.  One has a cape, the other has a mask.

The movie ends.  It's only 2:00.  For real?  This is the longest day in the history of mankind.  I'm sure of it.  Some kind of solstice must be on this day.

I tell them we are going home, I need to rest for a bit, and these are their options while I am sleeping.  Tucker whispers, "Yes!  We can do whatever we want!"  And so I list the options again.

I wait until everyone is captivated by their favorite something, and I fall into bed.  I am uncomfortable falling asleep while they are awake, but I simply cannot finish this day without a break.  I pray for their safety, and I wonder if I reminded them that they absolutely must stay in the house... but I don't worry too long.  Because I am too sleepy.

"Mommy, can I have a popsicle?"

"Yes."

"Mommy, can my brother have a popsicle?"

"Yes."

My phone alarms.  My hour is up.  Just ten more minutes?  Can't I have ten more minutes...

In I-don't-know-how-many minutes, an iPod is blasting on my bedside table.  Tyler has awakened me to music.  And also, he is standing on my hair.

I don't want to be angry.  I wanted to sleep so I could be more patient.

I come downstairs.  Spiderman is throwing snowballs into the kitchen, through the open sliding door.  There are swimming pool toys all over the living room floor.  (Pool toys?)  I find a purple popsicle laying (melting) on my coffee table.

I sit at the dining table while they play with bungee cords.  I know not where they found them.  But they are giggling at their masterful creativity with them, pretending they are go-go-gadget arms.

My parents swoop in and save the day, my children, and me from each other.  Tyler and I are scheduled for a date tonight.  He opts out.  He would rather be with Grandma and Poppa.  He makes a reference to me being Miss Hannigan.

That's fine.  I don't have much 'date' in me tonight.  We'll reschedule for a time when we like each other.

My parents leave with the boys. I leave with no intentions.  I drive, drive, drive.  I am nearly to the mall before I realize I don't want anything to do with the mall.  I drive, drive, drive back from whence I came.

I settle in at Niccolo's, the pizza shop around the corner.  (Maybe in another life stage I'll eat things other than pizza.)  I sit alone.  I wonder if I look dreamy or dazed, or simply absent.  I don't really care.

I bring a book with me; Elizabeth Berg makes me want to write.  Her storytelling makes for excellent conversation with myself.  Just my pace.

I order the alfredo pizza with mushrooms and onions.  Robb and I had an honest-to-goodness fight over this pizza when I was pregnant.  He hates mushrooms and onions, and I was craving them both.  I felt entitled and thereby became irrational.  I truly did.

Tonight, I eat it alone.

Listen (...again).

It has been a year since I said these words, spoke them to an audience of hundreds, with my wedding handkerchief in my hand and my brother at my side. 

As I listen, I feel like it's someone else talking.  Who is that girl?

It's good for me to listen again.
To hear my voice,
to hear the scripture,
to hear the poetry,
to hear the truth.

Perhaps you heard this a year ago.
Or perhaps we have met since then.

I invite you to listen (...again).

King David and Joni Mitchell

Confession: I have been waiting for a Christmas miracle. 

I didn't know I had this hope in my heart until I awoke this morning, the day after The One Year, and my heart still hurt. 

Shouldn't I be able to think about other things? 
Shouldn't I be able to write about something else?
Shouldn't there be more joy, less sadness?

I mean, after all, I made it. I survived the year.  And many, many people walked, carried, prayed, and survived it with me.

Isn't there some kind of refreshment on this side of the finish line?

***

It's coming near Christmas,
they're cutting down trees.
They're putting up reindeer,
and singing songs of joy and peace.
Oh, I wish I had a river
I could skate away on.
I wish I had a river so long
I could teach my feet to fly.
Oh, I wish I had a river, I could skate away on.

~ Joni Mitchell, River

***

"Oh, that I had the wings of a dove!
I would fly away and be at rest -
I would flee far away and stay in the desert;
I would hurry to my place of shelter,
far from the tempest and the storm."

~ David, Psalm 55:6-8

***

Joni Mitchell. 
King David. 
They both wrote songs of lament,
O, to escape it all. 

I sing with them both this morning, on Christmas Eve.

Paper and Tags

This morning after The One Year is also Christmas Eve.  In so many ways, this feels like the first Christmas without him.

Did you know Christmas Eve was his favorite day of the year?  He most loved being a dad on this day, every year.  We stayed up late, putting toys together.  We had a gift-wrapping assembly line: he wrapped, I tagged and bowed.  He was the practical; I was the pretty.

I haven't wrapped a single gift yet.  Wrap without him?  I haven't done that in twelve years. 

Wrapping without Robb: that is the metaphor for anything good that's lacking the very best part.

And yet, two little boys are sure they've made the Nice List and Santa is bringing some amazing things.  Indeed he is.

Mommy needs to wrap them.

And so, it has been a Year.

Months ago, I began reading Henri Nouwen's book, The Genessee Diary.  

It is his published journal from inside a Trappist Monastery; he felt his life had become too mechanized, too secure, too predictable, too busy, too much writing about prayer instead of actually praying, too much thinking about theology and not actually worshipping, so he stepped away for a season.  He became a monk.  And he wrote about what this was like, what he learned.

In an ironic turn of the pages, he finished his seven months in the monastery just as I am finishing my first year as a widow.  Both he and I had sidestepped our lives as we knew them, reluctantly embraced a new season, and now together we embark on the end of the year.

(Never mind that he took his journey in 1981.  When I read your writing, your story becomes my present day.)

Henri, as I like to call him since we are now dear friends, wrote in his journal:

"I will have to ask myself what these months have meant to me.  I am still in it, but I see the end and the slow moving away to new experiences."

I set down the book with pause.  The same is true of me.  What has this year meant to me?  I am still in it, but I see the end.  And I see the turn of 2012 bringing new experiences.

I want to say I have learned nothing.  I want to say Robb's death was without meaning, these months have been empty, and I am bitter and angry because I got screwed hard out of everything I had planned for the rest of my life.  I want to say these things, boldly, with the strength that only comes from vindication.

But those things are not true.  I have learned much; these months have been sacred.  I have long said, if I will tell this story, I will tell the truth.  

So, here are my thoughts.

I have lived an entire year of winter.  There were sunny days that peeked through on occasion, but my heart stayed cold, bundled, protected.  Still, there are things to enjoy only in winter: good books, shorter days, enveloping blankets, and isolation.  I have relished in these.

In January, when I began speaking to God again, I made a deal with him: if he would just get me out of bed and safely to Starbucks, I would visit with him there.  I might not talk, but I would listen.  My mornings have been my sacred hours.  Starbucks has been my sanctuary. 

God has met me there.  My journals are filled with schizophrenic psalms, from temper tantrums to triumphant praise.  His companionship has been nearly tangible, certainly a presence I could feel strongly enough to know I wanted more.  In reading the Psalms, again and again, and again and again, I have let the psalmists cry out on my behalf, when I had no words left.

There's a reason why Psalm 88 made the cut into the final manuscript.

I have learned that there's no one way to be a perfect mother.  But there are a million ways to be a good one.  And, with God as my witness, his grace as my strength, I have been a damn good mother this year.

I have been willing to learn this year.  I have trudged ahead with my eyes open, insistent that this wrenching pain would not be wasted.  I have written a million words, unafraid of anything that might show up on the page.  I have found honesty and the beauty of saying things out loud.

A friend of Robb's recently wrote to me.  He said, "Tricia, when Robb talked about you, he always said you were an amazing woman who could handle anything."  My precious husband... he knew me well.  I never imagined the strength inside this frame.

I have learned firsthand that love is greater, stronger than the grave.  No matter what happens next, no matter the path I take or who walks beside me, I will forever love Robb Williford.  

This year has been the closing chapter of our marriage: I honored him, even after death parted us.

I choose to borrow some words from Henri, because great words should be shared, and because I can't say it better.

"For me, this is the end of a most blessed and graceful retreat and the beginning of a new life.  A step out of silence into the many sounds of the world, out of the cloister into the unkept garden without hedges or boundaries.  In many ways, I feel as though I have received a small, vulnerable child in my arms and have been asked to carry him with me out of the intimacy of [this place and] into a world waiting for light to come. 

Why was I here?  I don't know fully yet.  Probably I will not know fully before the end of the cycle of my life.  Still, I can say that I have a most precius memory which keeps unfolding itself in all that I do or plan to do.  I no longer can live without being reminded of the glimpse of God's graciousness that I saw in my solitude, of the ray of light that broke through my darkness, of the gentle voice that spoke in my silence, and of the soft breeze that touched me in my stillest hour."

Thank you, Henri.  You write my heart.

Thank you, Robb.  You hold my heart.

Thank you, God.  You heal my heart.

And so, it has been a year.

And So I Will Write

As I write this story, it can take days, weeks, months for me to verbally construct the most important scenes of my story, the moments before and after the hingepoint of my life.  A draft of a complete chapter is the product of dozens of hours of writing and - what's more - a thousand vivid revisits to my bedroom on the morning of December 23.

Let me tell you, this process can lay patterns and pictures in a girl's mind that can begin to shape her days.

And so, I've been counseled, advised, and requested to please put such writing on hold.  At least until I live this season.  Live it, then write about it.

Except in living it, I'm remembering, recalling it, putting words to it.  Every single day.

And if I'm remembering it, I can't let it go.  It's how artists work: the idea simmers and stirs until it twists and starts, bursting to breathe.

I can't very easily put a lid on this pot.

After and throughout such a tragic crisis, many people have said, "I just needed to get back to work.  I needed to do my job, engage the routines of my mind, and do the familiar."

Writing is my work.  I am writing this story.  

In the early days of this year, people, kindly and wisely, said to me, "You should wait 3-6 months before you see a counselor, before you begin therapy."  I guess there is a theory that one's mind should recover from the trauma before healing can truly take place.

And yet I thought, and said to them, "But what do I do until then?"  Do I just sit in this until somebody sets me free to start putting the pieces together?

No.  I began therapy right away.  This has been one of my best decisions this year.

And here I am, faced with the questions: to write or not to write?  To revisit the trauma with words or only in my mind?  To get through this month or to write through it?

But how do I get through it if I don't write through it?

The final verdict, from the therapist who holds my deepest respect and all of my story: 

"Tricia, get writing.  Trust that need like you trust your appetites.  Just like you eat when you're hungry, please write when you're stirring.  When you feel like you've written enough, or if you feel like you're writing too much and pushing too hard, then give yourself a break.  If it's helping you, lean into it.  Get writing, girl."

And so I will write.  

Through sunshine and rain, 

Christmas lights and Christmas carols, 

silver bells and jingle bells, 

holding on and letting go,

I will write.  And this is how I will live.

Let Every Heart

Joy to the world,

the Lord has come.

Let earth receive her king.

Let every heart prepare him room,

and heaven and nature sing.

I am realizing that I always thought of this lyric as my reminder to set aside the wrapping paper, shopping lists and bows, to slow down with the glitter and the ornaments, long enough to make room in my heart - for even a moment - to remember that this season is about so much more.

I know now: sadness will take up every inch it's allowed.

This Christmas could easily pass with my heart wrapped entirely in grief and gray.  As I listen to this song, it causes me to think differently.  

To make room in my sadness for joy.  

To allow my darkness to be soft enough to be aware of the light.  

To let sadness step aside sometimes.

To remember - for even a moment - that this season is about so much more than death, loss, and heartache.  

(Because I could very easily give my holiday to those three.)

May my broken heart prepare him room.

* * *

"May his light shine in our darkness and may I be ready to receive it with joy and thanksgiving." 

~ Henri Nouwen

Cheese Cubes and Orange Jello

I made an iPhoto slideshow, photos of Robb at Christmas.  I paired it with Sarah McLachlan's WinterSong, Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas, and Song for a Winter's Night.  These are the lyrics and melodies of my heart this season.

Dozens of pictures.

Robb hugging me in falling snow.
Robb teaching Tucker how to unwind the lights to hang outside.
Robb giving them their Christmas jammies that Santa always brought early.
Robb holding Tucker in the Baby Bjorn while he ironed the red satin bows for our Christmas tree.
The Christmas when Tyler was the bump inside my belly.
Tyler with a big, red bow on his noggin.
Robb teaching Tucker how to run the remote for the Christmas train, the one that circles our tree this year.
A picture of four Starbucks cups lined in a row, our treat last year before we drove around town looking at lights.
Robb playing his trombone at our church's event last Christmas, days before he would die.

I showed it to the boys tonight.  I wanted it to matter to them.  My expectations were perhaps unfair.  They wiggled and squirmed.  They had the attention spans of a four-year-old and six-year-old.  Imagine that.

"Look, boys.  Look.  Look.  Look!"  I became exasperated as I watched pictures go by - one of Robb helping Tucker play the trombone, another one of him wearing matching Santa hats with Tyler.

Please, boys, look.  I want you to know that this happened.

"Mommy, are you crying because we were so cute?"

"No, I'm crying because I miss Daddy.  I miss him."

"Mommy, I want my hot chocolate."

"Mommy, I want my blanket."

"Boys, I don't want to talk right now.  I don't want you to talk.  I want you to watch.  Please watch."

I wanted them to see the proof.  I am terrified they are forgetting.  I want them to know it happened.  It happened, boys. He was here.

The movie finished.  I was furious.
Furious that they didn't watch,
furious that my heart spills into my lungs and makes it hard to breathe,
furious that he isn't here.
Tears streamed down my cheeks.  
I held a tissue over my face to hide 'the ugly cry.'

"Mommy?"

"Yes, Tuck."

"I love Daddy.  And I miss him."

"Me, too, Tuck."

"But, Mommy?"

"Yes, Tuck."

He whispered, as if he were telling a shameful secret, "I'm just not sad right now."

Well said, my little man.  I understand that.  "It's okay, buddy. You don't have to be."

Tyler brought to me the painting of the panda Tucker made in kindergarten Art Club.  "Here, Mommy.  This will cheer you up."

I set it on the coffee table, amidst my wads of tissues.

They didn't need the movie tonight. I did.
They didn't need the reminders.  I did.
They are not forgetting him.
We talk about him everyday.
They haven't gone a year without looking at him.
His pictures line our walls.
He is alive in their minds.  Very alive in their minds.

And someday that movie will be a keepsake for them.  Proof: it really, truly happened.  He was really, truly here.

Tyler ate cheese cubes and orange jello for breakfast because I couldn't get out of bed this morning.  I couldn't get out of the damn bed.

And tomorrow waits for me.  And I'm pretty sure there's another day after that.

One Week Left

Dear Me on this day in 2010, 


You have one week left with him.  
Soak it up.  
Breathe him in.  
Study everything.  
Remember, remember, remember.  
And go on that morning coffee date.  


With love and sadness, 


The Changed You in 2011

Disassociation in the Final Countdown

It is the final countdown.  Only a matter of days until Robb has been gone for a year, until Christmas will happen around me, until we will wrap a neat and tidy bow on this neat and tidy year.

How do I feel, as the clock ticks?

Afraid.

Afraid of 2012.  Afraid that the one-year-mark will somehow lead others to believe I am stronger than I am, that this matters less than it does, that time heals all wounds.

Deceived.  Like I'm in the homestretch, the last lap, the end of the journey.  Like December 23 is some kind of finish line.  I am near none of those things.

My therapist says, "Tricia, time to nestle in for a long winter's nap.  Please consider hibernating.  Say no to as much as you can, and stop asking yourself why you can't keep up." 

My doctor says, "Tricia, you are absolutely normal.  And if you wake up tomorrow and you can't get out of bed?  That will be absolutely normal."

I find myself thinking and writing in third person.  I'm learning that it is far easier to think about how to write about this season than it is to actually live it.  It is far easier to think about the story of a widow at Christmas than it is to actually be one.

The professionals call this dissociation, a crucial survival mechanism that protects you during a crisis and afterwards. It helps you stay on task so you can protect yourself. If you are able to function without fully experiencing the emotional impact of an event, you can accomplish tasks until it is safer to face your emotions.

And so I attend Christmas pageants and sing boys to sleep and teach Christmas carols and shop for gifts and hang stockings and fold laundry and live and breathe and do this thing.  And perhaps I will think about it - really, truly think about it - later.

How do I feel about this final countdown?

Fine.  Fine, I guess.

The Algorithm

I landed in the ER again a couple of weeks ago: severe dehydration.

This was completely unrelated to panic or anxiety. (Dehydration is not the result of my life's season.  It's not that I forget to eat or drink because I'm a widow.)   In fact, I made it through the entire experience without any dips into the unconscious, without any meds to lower my blood pressure.

It was the flu.  I couldn't keep anything inside me.  Pardon the graphic details, but in case you discover that your lips are cracking from dryness, you haven't been able to pee in 14 hours, and you vomit from digesting ice chips, head on over to the ER.  They'll be waiting for you.

What is my deal this year?  I've been in the emergency room more times this year than I have in my entire previous three decades combined.  The good news: I think I've met my deductible.

It turns out, the part of my brain that responds to trauma is also the part that manages my immune system.  When my mind senses trauma (or a triggered memory of trauma), it throws all of its energy into helping me survive the moment.  It is forced to decide which is more important: emotional survival or physical strength.  Emotional survival wins this month. 

Someday, I will realize the toll on my body as my soul kept pushing forward.

Also, it turns out, this same part of my brain is the control center for all the symptoms of aging.  This is why I don't recognize myself in pictures - why those sad, crinkled eyes look unfamiliar to me.

Connect the dots however you like.  Trauma is grief is illness is aging.

Condolences

For a too brief moment in the universe the veil was lifted.  The mysterious became known.  Questions met answers somewhere behind the stars.  Furrowed brows were smoothed and eyelids closed over long unblinking stares.

Your beloved occupied the cosmos.  You awoke to sunrays and nestled down to sleep in moonlight.  All life was a gift open to you and burgeoning for you.  Choirs sang to harps and your feet moved to ancestral drumbeats.  For you were sustaining and being sustained by the arms of your beloved.

Now the days stretch before you with the dryness and sameness of desert dunes.  And in this season of grief we who love you have become invisible to you. Our words worry the empty air around you and you can sense no meaning in our speech.

Yet, we are here.  We are still here.  Our hearts ache to support you.

We are always loving you.

You are not alone.

~ Maya Angelou