Yes, I have children and I am a mother. But that seems besides the point. This is MY mother’s day. It is about my very own mother who raised me the best way she could figure out at the time. And it’s also about my halted, muddled attempts at realizing this and thanking her enough for any of it.
Peanut butter and banana sandwiches after school while watching Wheel of Fortune.
Kneading bread with heaps of brown sugar, flour, warm smells, rising comfort.
Flashcards in our green Plymouth station wagon, pulling a trailer of camping gear across country.
Homework at the dining room table while I cried and whined and dramatized how miserable math was. She sat there until it was done.
Scrawled crayon cards with pictures of princesses and unicorns and rainbows. Happy Mother’s Day Mommy.
A song once. Made up lyrics rhymed to the tune of “Free to Be, You and Me”. Maybe my last public declaration exclaiming how much I loved my mom.
Dropped at the bank to open a checking account without her help. A bus schedule and directions to the doctor’s office. Put on airplanes without an adult. Told to walk home. Call them yourself. I needed to learn. I did.
Angry and telling her so, all the time. Awkward attempts at affection. Her confused reasoning. Still angry, resigned, she’s my mother.
Errands to run, lists to follow, you go down this aisle, I’ll go down that one. Hold my bag. Go get a cart. Run over to that store, ask them for this, yes they will know what that is. Ignoring my looks, my arms folded, my whispers of “whatever”. We have to get all of this done today.
Cape Cod summers with my grandparents. She worked all summer. And we played at the beach.
Didn’t understand. Wouldn’t let me do anything. Never listened. The only person in the world with a mother like this. She waited, ignored, got on with it.
Car keys, an enormous old Ford Taurus, an empty beach parking lot, reading a book in a beach chair while I practiced over and over and over. You’ll get it, you’ll be fine.
Picked out cards in CVS. Which one made sense for her? My awkward attempts at thank yous. Not sure she heard them. Not sure I was genuine enough.
Consistent inconsistencies, eye-rolling frustrations, wishing for something else. And then I had children.
Her stories of parenting. Her constant advice. Breastfeeding never hurt for her, it must be something I was doing wrong. They will figure it out. Be patient. Don’t be silly, you’re a very good mother. Kiss them for me.
A call. “Happy Mother’s day, Mom.” “Thank you. And to you too. How are the boys?” A call was enough somehow.
And then she was gone.
And now it’s Mother’s Day. But it’s not my day. It’s my mother’s day. So I am unsure of how to honor her without a call to make or sending scribbled thank yous on a CVS card.
So I suppose I’ll do what I usually do every day since she died: remember, wonder, grieve, apologize, wish, consider. But really just remember.
I don’t claim to be much of a gardener. But by no means should that imply that I don’t love to garden. I’m not sure how it happened actually. I fought it for years, but it’s joy lay deep below, patient and waiting.
As a child, my mother had a garden plot a few blocks from our home. She piled my brother, myself and her garden tools into her station wagon and hauled us all over there. We didn’t particularly like going. We were bored. I would wander down the mulched paths in between stringed off gardens boasting lovely heads of lettuce, squash and snap peas lost in whichever fantasy I had currently replaying in my mind. My mother would call me back, and could I bring the wheel barrow over while I’m at it.
I remember the year she had grown so many tomatoes. Heaps and heaps of them. She was given a book about “Too Many Tomatoes” and set to canning. I remember the smell of vine ripened tomatoes and then stewing tomatoes. I didn’t even like tomatoes. There were just so many of them which she found very amusing and clucked on about daily. *Shrug* I was six. What did all of those tomatoes really matter.
When I finally moved into my first apartment with a little bit of land, I never expected to consider gardening. But as the cold months finally passed and green buds piqued the trees, something unfurled within. As if some gene which I had no control over had finally matured itself and pushed through. Maybe I should go pick up a few bulbs? Maybe a trowel. Maybe some better soil.
But I am missing the skill portion of this gardening gene. And so my first garden was a catastrophe. Bulbs had been placed too close together, enormous plants grew on too small a plot of land and then one flower took over like a weed and spread everywhere. Things were leaning, nothing matched, hopeful flowers were strangled and started dying. I forgot to water. What’s the difference between and annual and a perennial, I had no idea.
Years have passed and I have my own home now. Usually I tend to my small garden of children so I spend less time heeding my temptation to grow much outside. But I try every few months to make an effort with my garden. It is a Florida garden however with extreme heat and humidity and then occasional damaging freezes. We have horrid sandy topsoil which is regularly overturned and dug through by a local armadillo. And then there are hoards of fire ants ready to strike any flip-flopped foot that happens to misstep. I don’t know the names of what grows here so growing any of it is some version of garden Russian roulette. But I dig a hole, plant one in there and certainly try. Sure, only about 50% of what I have put in has had lived on with much success, but I try.
Today I put in sod. Last year our backyard was bulldozed suffered at the hand of a wild boar and five of her babies. The weeds whooped and hollered as they crowded in and took over. But today my husband and I trucked in slab after slab of sod and threw together a patch work of grass which we hope will make its mark and regain the upper hand. As we stood there coated in dirt and sweat, watering and stomping at the ground, I felt good. The dirt felt good. The soil and water and all of it combined in a muddy green grassy mass smelled divine. I am growing something.
A few weeks ago, I tentatively planted a tomato plant in a pot on my back porch. Because, you guessed it, I like tomatoes now. I adore them. I wish I could ask my mother how she did it but I would bet the care and the organic mulch and the specific zone she lived in had everything to do with it. Nevertheless, I am trying it. And so now I go out onto my porch everyday and stare at my plant. Would you believe one of those lovely papery tomato flowers bestowed a small gift the other day? Yes, a small green tomato has shown itself. I hardly have too many tomatoes – but I have one. One and maybe another as I tentatively water it’s soil and will the next papery flower to produce a friend.
There is a magic in growing. A small, dry seed can become something real and green, stalked and hardy. Soil and all of it’s rich substance anchors the potential of food and beauty and shade. Water. Have you ever seen what a good soaking rain will do to a garden? It all stretches to the sky and reaches and reaches. It greens and buds and flowers and creates fruit and color and hope.
Clearly, there is also therapy in gardening and growing. We lose ourselves, find our thoughts and enjoy this quiet peace while tending and tending and tending until it exhausts us. We place our attention on something which doesn’t take anything away. We find creativity in growth and life while reigning in and respecting all the possibilities of the natural world.
It is certainly no coincidence. I have snuck back into my garden because it offers a careful promise of life and hope. A promise I tend to, hoping my love of gardening which was passed on to me might actually heal me.
Its a phenomenon to be sure.
And again, it’s not one I claim to have much of a handle on. Don’t expect bright swaying trellises of bougainvillea and enormous bushels of Birds of Paradise or hearty fruit trees weighed down with orange treasures or even a lawn that grows one type of grass (as much as I lust for all of this). But you might expect a small tray of sunflowers poking their way up on the sunny side of the house. Or one clump of Bird of Paradise make a respectable run for it in the front yard. And a fairly successful patch of petunias keeping my mailbox company.
Oh yes and one small green tomato, which smells exactly like my mother’s garden plot. You’ll find me next to it, staring it down and finding pride in it’s possibility. I’m here remembering my mother and hoping to find all the same amusement and joy she plucked out of her own garden. And also, like my mother from 30 years prior overwhelmed by her harvest, I am here clucking on about my one dear tomato daily. Because this first tomato does matter.
Magic is always pushing and drawing and making things out of nothing. Everything is made out of Magic, leaves and trees, flowers and birds, badgers and foxes and squirrels and people. So it must be all around us. In this garden – in all the places.
A year ago today my world was rocked by news about a little girl I had never met. If you’ve been reading my blog for awhile you probably remember that time well. On the other side of the country, another blogger’s daughter – a little girl named Maddie – had passed away. However, in the wake of her death, her community reacted. And this enormous outpouring of love and connection created something bigger than any of us ever expected.
If you are only now being introduced to Maddie, I suggest you jump over here and learn more about her. This child’s story has touched thousands and thousands of people. She put a beautiful face on an important cause and moved bloggers and families everywhere to act immediately. And we did.
Last year, Maddie’s team raised more money for the March of Dimes than any other family team. I was proud to be part of that team - my family walked with other bloggers here in Tampa. Shoot, little ol’ me raised almost $600 for the March of Dimes. Maddie made me do it, I swear.
Today, Heather Spohr is mourning the loss of her daughter one year ago. One year. Without her sweet baby girl. My heart is with her, my heart is with her, my heart is with her.
This spring here in Florida, we’ve had a crazy outbreak of purple wild flowers. Everywhere. I’ve lived in Florida for over 6 years and I don’t remember seeing these flowers before. For days, I’ve been passing fields of these flowers. Of course, the small patch that popped up in my back yard inpired me to snap a few pics. They are tiny, they are many, they are gorgeous. And do you know what all that purple has been reminding me to do?
Remember Maddie.
She loved purple. And purple stands for the March of Dimes. And I had better not forget that.
So I’m here to share these flowers here so that you won’t forget either. And perhaps you might consider donating to Maddie’s team this year. I’m walking with somefabulouswomen. And we’ll even be wearing tu-tus (here’s why). Come on, don’t you want to be a part of that? How about this. If I raise a lot of money, I’ll post pics of me leaping through the streets of Tampa, rocking that purple tu-tu with pride and passion.
(Come on, who are we kidding? I’ll post pics of me doing that anyway.)
So donate. Anything. Coins under couch cushions are accepted.
And please remember Maddie today and all that she stands for. Thank you.
It’s my mother’s birthday today. She would have been 67.
Like I’ve done most years on this day, I wish I was sitting here feeling badly about not having sent her anything too spectacular for her birthday. Usually she might get some picture or drawing or small little last minute thing from the kids. Which she loved. She was not a fan of getting older. She never expected the red carpet treatment and I don’t think she wanted any attention drawn to the fact anyway. But she always appreciated the little stuff. The little stuff was just fine.
I wish she was back home watching all those bulbs she worked so hard to get into the ground finally coming up. And the daffodils and forsythia. I wish she knew about all that has happened since her death this summer. My 3yo is finally potty trained and going to school and kind of reading now. And my 6yo lost all kinds of teeth, is growing so fast and got straight A’s on his report card. And that book she bought him for his birthday last May, the one about all the baseball parks, I want her to know he has read and loved that book so much, its cover is gone, the binding is cracking and pages are slipping out.
And folks could say she’s here and she knows and she is with us. I know she is. I can feel her lots of the time. But it’s not enough. Call me selfish but I wish she was at the other end of the line when I call the DC house. I wish I could drive down to the Tampa airport and watch her get off the escalator, bumbling along with a million bags, her huge jug of water and hair askew, excited for another visit with her grand kids. THAT’S what I want.
I’m not grateful enough for what I have of her now just like I wasn’t grateful enough for what I had then. Things don’t change I suppose.
I was having one of those days this morning and it wasn’t even 9:00am yet. Snuggled deep into my covers, I was on the phone with my BFF. Amongst other things, I had missed her birthday and called her as soon as I had a minute to get to the phone. Where is my brain these days? And I was so sorry. So we talked and she is amazing and I sniffled along, trying to figure out a way to suck it up today.
That’s when I saw some birds. Well, a lot of birds in fact. Hundreds, maybe thousands. Circling in the sky. And they circled and swooped in the distance for the duration of our call. When I hung up, promising myself that today would start getting better, I walked out on to my back porch to see them a little better. So did my six year old. My Flip happened to be right there so I pushed open the screen door, turned on my camera and caught such an amazing sight.
I have seen birds like this in my yard before actually. This is the second time. (I wonder if flocking like this is a seasonal thing?) But this time there were more, and it was somehow more breath-taking than I remember (you will hear me catch my breath on the video below). While I watched them swoop and dive overhead, I couldn’t help but remember the words of a poem that I read at my grandparents memorial service years ago:
Do not stand at my grave and weep
I am not there; I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow,
I am the diamond glints on snow,
I am the sun on ripened grain,
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you awaken in the morning’s hush,
I am the swift uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circled flight.
I am the soft stars that shine at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry,
I am not there; I did not die.
It seems at times we all need to pay attention to the signs around us. Things happen for a reason. Watch, listen – the answers and quiet comfort will come. Take this for what you may but, for me, this was truly a moment in the morning’s hush and the swift uplifting rush of quiet birds circled in flight. And I was grateful for it.
P.S. Something you might not notice in this video was what sounded like rain falling. It wasn’t rain. And, since I was out there underneath it all, I got hit with it more than once.
Someone told me once that being shit on by a bird was good luck. Perfect. I’m going with that.
It’s been a little quiet here for the past couple days. Because it happened again. Another tragedy in 2009. A friend and Florida bloggerlost her two year old son in a very sudden pool accident.
It simply left me speechless.
Shellie and I met this year at a blogger event. She is wonderful. Recently, she promised me I could come watch the next shuttle launch from her beautiful front porch. She had just moved into her new home. She sent me a picture and its stunning. And now this happens.
Nothing shifts the world off its axis more than the passing of a child.
Nothing.
And unfortunately I have seen two other mothers lose their beautiful babies this year too.
I thought I understood how it felt to mourn. I was so wrong. I still feel like the world froze in its place on July 25th and now I’m looking around, blinking with surprise, asking “What’s with all the Christmas stuff? Summer isn’t over. No way. My mom JUST died. What the hell is going on here?”
And then, right before Thanksgiving, with visions of healing holiday joy dancing in our heads, news about Anissa’s brain bleed was shared. And to say that her future is uncertain… well. That would be an enormous understatement. She is amazing, her improvements are mind boggling. But still, my friend is in a hospital simply trying to communicate when I know she’d rather be home raising her children and tweeting about bewbs.
In between all of this, there have unposted tough times too. A best friend moved away, friends have had miscarriages, there have been broken hearts, dramas, and far too many lost jobs.
So I was already counting down to the end of 2009. Totally ready to wipe my hands of it, away with you, don’t let it hit ya where the good Lord split ya.
And then this.
So. Now. For real. Sure, yes, there have been somegreathighlights to this year but I am so done. SO DONE. So pissed and angry and hateful for all the sad that has unfolded, one month after another. It’s outrageous.
Enough.
Peace out 2009.
And 2010? Karma kind of owes a few people one helluva year. Here’s hoping.
To those who have lost loved ones or suffered a tragedy or loss this year, my heart is with you.
It’s so predictable isn’t it? The holidays arrive on the scene and *BAM* time to get all buuuummed out again. Yup, here I’ve been moving along pretty well the past few months. I’ve somehow managed to keep my “happy” momentum going at a fairly steady, normal-ish pace… and then the holidays come along and that momentum fades to a slow, hiccuping crawl.
Because, oh yeah. My mom is gone.
It’s a strange thing. My mother has lived many states away from me for almost two decades. She’s even lived continents away from me at times. It’s been years since I’ve lived near my mother for very long periods. Honestly, I’m not sure either of us would have survived it if I had. So I have prepared for the holidays without her many times over. I’ve spent most Thanksgivings without her. I’ve even had quite a few Christmases without her too.
So why is it that this year, as I drive by neighborhood decorations and pick up a poinsettia for my front stoop, that I feel such blank, cold loss?
Ok, sure. It’s because she’s gone.
But still. Sometimes (and here’s when the guilt creeps it’s way in) the void she’s left rings through my soul much MUCH more loudly than her actual presence ever did. She seems to have made a larger impression on my life dead than she did alive.
Ugh. That’s real nice.
But I’ll just assume there’s probably some very logical explanation for this, straight out of a psychology text book, under the chapter marked “Grieving Process”. (There better be, or else it’s probably found under the chapter marked “Sucky Daughter”.)
Whatever it is, I have no say over it. I’m simply sad because someone – who was never here very much anyway – is gone forever.
Here’s the thing. I LOVE Christmas time. I totally over-do the lights and holly and the silver and gold. And Christmas music? I think I may have five versions of every jingle. You want “Winter Wonderland”? Well, I’ve got that in Bing Crosby, Louis Armstrong and Frank Sinatra. Bring it. I love to get all holly jolly up in here.
So I really WANT to be happy. And I think I can be happy this year. I just need a little Christmas cheer, that’s all. Because I don’t have our tree up yet (we only just got back from our Atlanta a few days ago). But I would bet my last candy cane that I’ll feel much much better once we do. MUCH better. And when we go to see the local Christmas lights show, I’ll simply ooze with yuletide glee. And then I’ll make some sugar cookies (and stuff my face with half the batch), pour myself a hearty glass of wine, haphazardly toast my fantabulously over-decorated tree and fricking CRANK those Christmas tunes… (Mmmmm, Christmas with the Carpenters. That Karen, she has got a voice of an angel, I tell you….)
That’s called COPING, people.
Really though, I just need to learn to do things differently this year. I need to work around the loss. Not ignore it. Just acknowledge that its there, maybe drop a little tinsel on it, offer it a spot near the tree and hand it over a cup of rum-soaked eggnog. There’s no other way around it – grief and loss will just have to be part of the… er… festivities.
So, here’s where I pull myself up by my Christmas stockings and get on with it.
Right?
Just get on with it.
Ching ching ching.
Deck those halls.
Feel the spirit.
Ok.
….ok.
(And here’s a little Christmas diddy for my mom from Karen herself…)
The brain is an amazing thing. It takes flying leaps of faith and swears to truth – when there is nothing. It fills in gaps with synaptic trickery to cover over painful voids. It holds on to years of experience and pieces together something realistic – simply because it remembers. It relies on the empirical but bases its final verdict on emotion. It simply wants to believe.
Yeah, well, it seems that when someone close to you in your life passes away, you experience the same kind of thing.
Phantom Mom Phenomenon.
No, it’s not what you think. My mother has not appeared to me in a shimmering, white form next to my bed insisting I buy a replacement pumpkin Mickey ball.
At least, not that I am aware of.
No, I’m talking about that phenomenon where you swear that person is really still there. Still alive. Still sitting in her office in her DC home playing solitaire at her computer with one cigarette smoldering in her ashtray, furry slippers on her feet and an Ensure on ice on the desk.
My father knows what I’m talking about. Without thinking, he has caught himself calling out her name while waking up in the morning. He finds himself picking up her usual groceries at the store. He assumes she is home when he arrives, her shoes tucked neatly by the door seemingly filled only minutes before.
I struggle in my own ways too. I assume that the call coming in from “DC Home” on my cell is always my mother – as it has been for years. And even when it’s my father’s voice, it takes a moment to register because my mind has simply given my mother’s voice a little extra gravel and depth – she just needs to clear her throat. No wait. She’s dead. It’s Dad. Whoa. Ok. Hi Dad.
And I have been having these recurring dreams recently. Or maybe they’re nightmares. I’m not sure. To put it in the words of the lovely Beyonce, it could be a “sweet dream or a beautiful nightmare“. Whatever you call it, my brain convinces me on a regular basis that my mother is in fact very much alive.
Cruel isn’t it? Although I am guessing this is all probably very typical. Nevertheless, here’s how my dream goes…
In my dream, my mother’s death is only her family’s collective nightmare. In my dream, it is early in the morning and we are all gathered in front of my living, breathing mother. Fresh from our beds, we stare in utter shock, while she stares back at us and laughs. We tell her we thought she was dead. “I’m FINE” she insists. “No really.” And she looks back at us again like we’ve lost our ever-loving minds. And then we ask her how she pulled off the memorial service, the whole casket thing. “Because Mom, you really looked dead.” But she seems to insist we all just had some doozy nightmares. No big deal. She is currently alive and well. And then she goes into full “Mom mode” listing off all the chores we need to accomplish, which stores we need to hit first, full of sass, full of too much “get up and go” that instinctively makes me roll my eyes and prepare myself to become her daylong personal assistant. It’s so real. She IS alive in that dream. And in the end we are all entirely convinced, shaking our heads at our assumptions, letting the nightmare fade away. It was just a bad dream. My mother isn’t dead. Phew, phew (even though we have to do chores now), PHEW.
But of course I wake up and she is dead. And that wonderful dream seems more like a nightmare. As wonderful as that moment was, the truth unlocks a fresh wave of grief. My brain, the tricky minx, brought her back to life. My brain knew exactly how to make her breathe and talk and task-master us with chores once again. My brain had convinced me.
Not cool.
But why do I have the urge to call my brother when I wake up and share with him that she’s actually fine? That she insisted she was, no REALLY.
Who knows. I mean, our brains are pretty smart things, right? And they may know something our rational, consciousness does not. Something could actually be setting off alarm bells deep within telling us she IS here. Somehow. Around. And fine. Whether she is real because of our rich, vivid memories, or she is now something more other-worldly and deeply spiritual. Maybe she is filling her own void in a new and different way.
I believe that. I do. But still. She’s gone. And my brain and I miss her.
My mom spent the last four Halloweens with us. She loved watching the kids get dressed up and carve pumpkins. She gladly held down the the fort and gave out candy while we set off to trick or treat. And last year, she helped me make a ghost for our front yard. I remember her finding the perfect gauzy material from the store. I remember her confidently running her hands over it, knowing exactly how much would work. After all, she had made these for my brother and I many years in a row, many years before. And before I knew it, she had created the very same ghost I grew up with, fresh from my childhood.
So yes. This Halloween, her ghost is here. In some way or another. In my dreams. In my memories. In my front yard. Or how she more often feels – only a breath away, over my shoulder, wishing me peace and whispering “I’m FINE. No really.”
My mother was a stubborn woman. When she wanted something and she felt strongly about it, she gleefully dug right in. Logic often played a part in her decision making. But sometimes it did not. Sometimes she dug in simply to boldly stamp herself on a debatable issue – and she often did it in spite of herself. You think this idea is silly? Well, guess what. I’m doing it no matter what you think. Sometimes this tendency of hers made us crazy. But most times, it could be downright endearing – in a maddening sort of way.
And that’s what happened with my mother’s Disney car antenna decorative Mickey balls.
Let me back up a bit here.
When my mom passed, I got her car. And I don’t care what you think about such a thing, I felt really weird about it. Yes, I know we needed a new car desperately. And yes, her car had very few miles on it. And yes, I know, she would have wanted this but still. It felt plain weird.
Like throwing away her toothbrush, like tossing her favorite breakfast drinks, like rummaging through her personal things in the days following her death – taking her car seemed like one more thing I was taking away from her previously organized life. It was another way to officially proclaim her time using these things was over.
This car that she loved so much. This car, a practical shade of red so that she could spot it easily in the parking lot, would never be driven by her in that kind of jerky way that I tried not to hassle her about. This car of hers, that I’m now driving through the car line at school pick up, that I am now playing my music in, that now has two car-seats strapped into the back – this car, I don’t care what that title says now, it is still hers.
Before we drove her car to Florida a couple weeks following her memorial service, I grabbed a bag of hers that I knew came with this car’s ownership. I could not leave with out it. It was a bag of seasonally appropriate Disney car antenna decorative Mickey balls.
Yes, there is obviously a story about those decorative Mickey balls. And here it goes.
A few years ago, my mother was in Downtown Disney with all of us and bought one lone Christmas themed Mickey ball. When she got home to her car, she plonked it right on her antenna. And my Dad hated it. He was NOT a fan. Not that it was his car, but he was happy to announce he thought that seasonal Mickey ball was silly nevertheless.
Well. That simply fueled her fire. During her next visit down to Florida, my mother bought an entire kit of decorative Mickey balls for her antenna. She proudly owned Christmas, Valentine’s day, Easter, 4th of July, Halloween and Thanksgiving. Except that she lost Halloween in a car wash. My father was over-joyed, until she stomped right out and plonked Thanksgiving onto her antenna. So there. It became a running joke between both of them. He shook his head at her while she religiously changed those damn Mickey balls as the seasons went by. Plus, much like her own mother (who used to tie gaudy, plastic flowers to her antenna), it was yet one more practical identification aid used while searching for her car in a parking lot. Oh yes, the red car with the Santa Mickey decorative antenna ball, that’s my mother’s car. My father would laugh and grumble under his breath and she would tromp ahead in the parking lot. She had dug in and that was that.
So today we put up our fall decorations. I hauled out the ghost lights and plug-in pumpkins and the favorite “trick or treat, smell my feet” sign that now hangs in our family room. The seasons are changing (in spite of the heat in Florida) and it was time to decorate appropriately. And once everything was out of its boxes and set up just so, I went into my room and found the bag of those dreaded Mickey Mouse balls. I rummaged around, knew I wouldn’t find the pumpkin, but pulled out the pilgrim Mickey ball instead. Then, I marched out to the garage, pulled off the 4th of July Mickey she had put on there months ago, and plonked that pilgrim right on.
Sure, I live in Florida and kind of cringe at that seasonal Mickey antenna ball. I mean I heart Disney for sure, but I try to be cool about it. Real Floridians wouldn’t sport Disney all over their car, right? But this isn’t a Floridian’s car. This is my mother’s car. And it is my very small, very silly but fully meaningful tribute to her.
Mom, I know you love that it’s on there. Happy Halloween. We miss you with the changing of every season.
In the process and weeks following my own loss, September 11th has arrived again for the 8th time. Stories and remembrances fill my heart and refresh the feelings, the comprehension, the entire concept of loss – and loss which occurred more than 3,000 times over one morning in September. Loss that we were not prepared for. Loss when we thought everything was ok. Loss when we assumed we were safe.
This past February, I had the opportunity to visit Ground Zero and walk through St. Paul’s Chapel located across from Ground Zero where so many firefighters, EMT workers and first responders went to re-coop during the days following this event.
At this time, it is the only real place in New York City one can visit to pay tribute to the lives lost on 9/11. And I was honored to be there.
What were my feelings?
I felt an enormous void. It was all much too quiet. The vast space where the towers stood was empty. And all of those voices who were buried in each collapse were silent. They were gone. Everything was simply gone. Certainly, there was an energy of enormity, the air felt still and thick with 3,000 lost, the ghosts of that day were real, they were there. But for so much lost so fast, it felt as if there was nothing left as collateral. Nothing there equitable to all that was taken. This flat, empty construction site was all there was. An enormous void.
I also felt a great deal of respect and appreciation for those who organized themselves and handed their lives over to Ground Zero and the horrors it revealed. I was astounded by the stories. So much more happened during those days between individuals deep in the heart of this tragedy than most of us even realize. This post couldn’t possibly do justice to how much was simply given in those days following 9/11. Or ultimately convey just how much the 343 first responders lost in this tragedy, the men and women who ran in while everyone else ran out, were willing to give up for their own community and country. They were there to save lives and then bring the dead back to their families. Their intentions and efforts should always be honored and carried through.
To truly understand the impact St. Paul’s and the surrounding churches, people and communities had on the recovery efforts of 9/11, please watch this video. And maybe, instead of reading my hiccuping attempts at stringing words together, you’ll actually “get it”. And “get” WHY our President is correct to name this day as a day of service.
These men and women are why we should be inspired. We should carry their strength and commitment with us in our own communities. Stop, do something, give back, carry on their legacy. It is the one flicker of hope that we can resurrect on this day, September 11th, the day our worlds were rocked by a loss we continue to steady ourselves from eight years later.
Mother’s Day is not my day.
It’s so predictable isn’t it? The holidays arrive on the scene and *BAM* time to get all buuuummed out 
Phantom Mom Phenomenon.
My 
This past February, I had the opportunity to visit Ground Zero and walk through 
I also felt a great deal of respect and appreciation for those who organized themselves and handed their lives over to Ground Zero and the horrors it revealed. I was astounded by the stories. So much more happened during those days between individuals deep in the heart of this tragedy than most of us even realize. This post couldn’t possibly do justice to how much was simply given in those days following 9/11. Or ultimately convey just how much the 343 first responders lost in this tragedy, the men and women who ran in while everyone else ran out, were willing to give up for their own community and country. They were there to save lives and then bring the dead back to their families. Their intentions and efforts should always be honored and carried through.
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