Entries Tagged 'Death' ↓

I found out this morning that my mother has passed away.

It was not expected. She was far too young. Writing these words seem shocking. The world around me has just came to a screeching, violent, shuddering halt.

We were supposed to drive up to see her today in fact. And when I got the call from the house, I expected her voice on the line, asking if we were on the road yet.

It wasn’t her. It was someone else. My mother was gone.

And all day I have hidden myself in a hotel room, making calls, sharing news, calming people, trying to calm myself, at times shaking too much to dial the phone, at times numb - my fingers only vaguely tingling, at times laboring to breathe, at times gripped throughout with such unexpected surprising pain, I cry out.

Grief.

It’s odd. I feel like I am watching myself from the outside in. Watching the shadows of this loss pass over me again and again. I mean, how are people supposed to act when they find out their mothers have died? Whats the norm for this sort of thing? I look around, wondering what emotions come next, what guilt, what anger, what wonder.

And then the “what ifs”. They come a lot too.

My mother. I pray for her peace. For her inner joy to beam through where ever she is. Who knows. Maybe she’s actually just sitting here on the bed next to me. Or maybe she’s swimming in some heavenly ocean, the way she used to, with her enormous glasses still on, hair somehow still dry, floating, belly up and toes up, rocking and bobbing away, free, happy, peaceful.

Honestly? I really hope she’s there and not here. This bed covered in kleenex and haphazard notes about funeral details and phone numbers is really not such a party.

This is really no place to spend your first day in heaven.

My mother. Rest, feel peace, enjoy your ocean. I miss you. I love you. I am without you.