One Week of Belly Laughs (Continued)

I was reviewing some old e-mails again from when my mom was in the hospital and I was struck by how much laughter and silliness coexisted with the anxiety and pain.  These correspondences made me smile and reminded me again how love prevails....always.

Day 1

Today I almost orchestrated a fender bender with my mom's car to which my sister responds " ehh, ...ehhhh,....ehhhh" (imagine her voice similar to that of an elderly woman with severe dimentia pointing to an object she can't quite place and moaning in agitation). Weirdest pre-accident alert I have ever experienced.

Day 2
Then there was the waitress who literally bounced to our table and in her best "way-to-peppy-rah-rah- elfin-voice" asked us if we wanted to be "beveraged"? Is that a real thing?

Day 3
I have now integrated the words "Hollah!" and "Booyahhhh...." into my pop slang repertoire. Don't ask me why or how, but the shows "Cougar Town" and "Raising Hope" have had some influence. If you hear my almost-forty-upper-middle-class-white-self say either of these YOU most probably will have a good belly laugh.

Day 4
There was a hospital cafeteria episode. End result...the phrase "taco salad" now cascades a waterfall of giggles.

Day 5
I turn the wrong way EVERYTIME I go to the hospital, I left my purse at the store, I forgot my phone at the hospital and clearly my memory in Singapore.  Either that or my memory has taken a vacation. I am envisioning Memory laying in the sun, soaking up the rays with a tasty umbrella drink.
Hopefully she'll return to me refreshed and energized.

Day  6
My sister and I have resurrected the childhood game of finding the ugliest man in the the crowd and calling it first, "That's your boyfriend!" I'm winning.

Day 7
Other uplifting snap shots........They rolled mom over to wash her....of course her entire backside was smiling at all of us to which a family member says, "God she is big." To which I say "No, she is a Botticelli painting." And she is.

Addendum:  I always win the boyfriend game.  Always.

Map-less in Singapore

I can't sleep.

I am wondering where she is........not her body of course; that's easy enough to answer, but her essence, her energy, her soul....you choose your spiritual lingo.

Recently, my seven year old niece comforted her teary eyed mama with the words, "Don't be sad about Grammy.  She's in heaven.  She's happy there.  She's having fun!"

This reminded me that I used to know as a kid.  She was in heaven; a beautiful, serene alter universe somewhere high above the sky, above space even.  She'd be surrounded by friends and family who had already stamped their passports and immigrated to the new land.  I often envisioned them gathered around a long, obtrusive dining table.  It's dark, solid wood fighting to dominate the room; trying tirelessly to turn it's patrons into miniatures of themselves.  It doesn't work.  These people are larger than their former selves, not physically, but something big and luminous is definitely radiating from within.   It's as if everyone in this new place had been indoctrinated with lightness and contentment.  The room is stuffed with happiness; the laughter is raucous and heartfelt.  The food looks exquisite and of course there is wine (we are Italian after all....even in seven-year-old heaven).  It reminds me of an indulgent, medieval feast and, as a child, this brought me much comfort.  Heaven.  A revolving door of giant re-unions.  So many infact, that they quickly become just "unions" deeming the "re" obsolete.

So then I grew up.......a little.

I don't think I am jaded or subscribing to the "Negative Nellie" way of life when I say that my seven-year-old version is a little to bubblegumesque for the adult me to swallow.
I chuckle as I now envision a long line of new recruits approaching the gates of Heaven, nervously and suspiciously shuffling towards the guard. Their left sleeve is rolled up and their bare arms outstretched.  As the passports are stamped and the entry visas distributed, a syringe is nonchalantly jabbed into the unsuspecting newcomer and the happy serum is successfully injected.

 Hmmmmm.

This heaven is closely resembling that of a prison camp.

And what about all that "happiness"?  The seven-year-old girl doesn't realize how oppressive all that lollipop imagery can be. The happy happy was palpable in heaven's dining room.  So much so that you needed gumboots to wade through it all.  It was competing with the oxygen in the room and the adult me is simply suffocating.  Bring on some brooding for desert so I can breathe.

Who am I kidding?....I AM jaded. Maybe my subconscious is filled with too many images of horrific atrocities that have gone on in THIS life.  Or perhaps it is because I just read the highly entertaining, but seriously dark "Hunger Games" trilogy. Maybe it's just my mood or that it is 5:00 am and I need more coffee.

Whatever it is, I suspect my ID and EGO are having realationship trouble and my SUPEREGO ???....isn't he the gatekeeper or something?  ......Must be taking the morning off.

At times, I am envious of those who have absolute faith in one religion.  I actually am more comfortable using the word "way" and so I will do so here.  I can't even commit to the WORD religion so you can see how deeply my predicament is rooted.  Lets begin again.

At times, I am envious of those who have absolute faith in one way.  They are on their journey equipped with a map.  They have unwavering commitment and fortitude and a guide pointing them in a direction.  Right now I am a map-less.  My compass is in a frenzied state of relentless circling. 

All I have is my travel journel with a few words scribbled down.  It's all I am confortable with at this time.
The words are:
Way
Energy
Source

It's all I have but it's a start.

Settle Me Down

29 days until we do it.  

The thing is I still don't feel like she is dead.  I want to feel her death.  I want it to be brutally honest, forthright, in my face.  I want to be wounded.  Really wounded.  I want to watch the blood flow warm and slow. 


So where are you Pain?  When are you going to show up?  I'm ready.  I'm waiting.  I'm actually getting annoyed with your ambivalence.  Come on! 

I welcome Apathy.  I embrace Bitterness.  The invites have been posted and a wonderful soiree has been prepared for us all........ And yet the tea grows cold as the clock ticks on.  You have stood me up and all I am left with is this quiet room. 

You didn't call.  You didn't message.  There was no warning that I was to be abandoned.  Did you all conspire together?  I should be Angry but I'm not; even he has fled the scene.

And so the bath is drawn, the marketing is done, books are read, meals prepared, nails are painted, toddlers are put to sleep, husbands are loved.....it all goes on and on....and I want to scream, "Turn it off! Make it stop!"  Shouldn't the world at large be in some state of mourning?  Shouldn't the planet be spinning slower on its axis?  And what about MY world, shouldn't it be stopping altogether?

I just can't seem to FEEL the reality of it all.  Grief hasn't shown up like I thought, suitcase in hand, ready to move into the guest room.  She comes in odd waves and pangs like she is sneaking up on me from behind.  I'll be changing a diaper or buttering the toast and there she is without warning.  She seizes me in a way that hasn't occurred before.  My chest tightens, breath knocked away, and I am left paralyzed and suffocating in her clutches.  It all lasts a few moments and the attack usually goes unnoticed.  She's cunning and she's quick and I actually welcome these assaults.  For a few seconds when I can't find a breath and my heart seems to have stopped..... I get it.  She is dead and I can FEEL the deadness.  It might not feel good but it feels real and that for me is a comfort.  Then as quick as it came on it dissipates into the air before me.  It reminds me of waking from a dream when the last image is fading before me into fuzzy, disjointed pixels. I try everything to hang on to the picture and place those hazy dots back together, but to no avail. They have scattered into the universe and are not to be returned.

Perhaps this surrealism is a symptom of me living so far away from my mom, 9362 miles to be exact.  But upon further investigation....I don't think so.  My sister is prey to the same phenomenon and she only lives 32 miles away.  Then there is my dad who is also a member of the "none of this feels real" club and he slurped his coffee across from her every morning. 

So I was prepared to fight and it was a forfeit.  I was prepared to clink glasses with misery and her gang but they were a no show.  I should be happy about this and yet it's oddly unsettling.

I am ready to be settled.