This morning I sit in my new yellow jacket, a color you once told me I looked sickly in and have avoided ever since, in my favorite coffee shop in Portland. I love my new jacket, and decided that if wearing yellow makes me happy, who cares if my skin looks pasty and ill; I think you would actually like how I look in it, or at least the smile it makes me feel inside.
In any event, I wasn't thinking about you at this moment until I spread some jam on my bread and there was a little chunk of butter left on the knife and they both found themselves spread there together, a thick swirl of pink and yellow on my baguette. And this funny little thing,reminded me of you because you liked jam and butter together on your bread and I, generally do not. It made me think of how when you would toast us jalapeno bagels for breakfast and spread the cream cheese on them in thick, uneven globs and how it drove me nuts; how I would always take my finger and re-spread the cheese to make it even and uniform around my bagel. How when I have my thumbs pointed inward on the steering wheel, they look like yours. How I wonder if your friends would recognize me without the crown of your curls on my head anymore. How I both love and hate to drive your car because it's not the same without you beside me. How I think of you every time I see a mother and daughter together and how much I want to say to them about about their good fortune in that moment. How I worry about having children without you there to give me guidence and direction and feedback and encouragement. And on and on and on...
And this is how it happens generally, the moments when you come to me; flashing suddently like lightning across my brain and through my heart, blindingly bright and unexpected. Only unlike lightening, you linger inside me for minutes, hours, days even; years on end now. As horrible as it sounds, sometimes I wish the thoughts of you would leave me as soon as the appear so that I can function in my daily life a little better without being bogged down with sadness of my loss of you. Alas, I suppose maybe this is god's way of encouraging me to see the glass half full and be happy for the flashes of you in my life instead of sad for the moments that will never happen; to remember to see the bigger perspective and be grateful.
A few weeks back in church the sermon was about all of our 'Cloud of Witnesses,' a term from Hebrews 12:1; those that have come before us and shaped our lives, our existence and our faith and who even if maybe not here in physical presences, surround us in spirit and witness our and encourage us to race forward in out lives with patience. In my life, this could is formed of many people who are no longer here such as you and your parents, but also by people I never knew but who have shaped the way that I think and feel and am in the world such as MKL, Gandhi, Thoreau, May Sarton, and many, many more. In any event, in thinking about these great cloud of witnesses that surround all of us, the reverend encouraged us to remember when we were young, and our mothers called us to dinner in the summertime; called us home and to be in this moment and know that this is part of who we are, this helped form the cloud of witnesses in our lives. And it was all I could do to not sit in that pew and bawl my eyes out because I wanted so badly in that moment for you to be sitting there next to me, just as I do every other Sunday and in millions of other moments in my life.
I suppose I am in still in the stages of grieving over the loss of you, because more times than not, thoughts of you may be momentarily happy, but leave me feelings sad and more than a bit vacant inside. I hope that someday, I will be able to remember when you called me to dinner and smile, and just smile, and not want to cry too. But in reality, I doubt that this will ever happen; that I will ever find peace in the loss of you so suddentely and violently from my life, that I will be able to let go of the anger I feel inside for your loss of life and you getting robbed of the many wonderful moments we all thought were ahead of you.
I have always been someone who believes that things happen for a reason and have been known to spout these words to friends who may be having a hard time in life for whatever reason or another. That was until you were ripped from my life without explanation and my faith in goodness and reason was questioned like never before. Right after you died, people would say this to me and it created a deep rage inside of me towards them in that moment, what I thought at the time was them making excuses and being inconsiderate. Only now, five years after your death, can I truly see, that your dying, has indeed served a purpose in my life (and I'm sure many others) and that I have grown exponentially in ways that I never would have had this not happened to you, and to me. I wonder, do you know that while in life you taught me more than any other, in death, you have taught me lessons and helped me see things that I don't know if I would have known or understood if you were still physcally here. It is my suspicion that this is true for others who knew and loved you as well.
As I sit here drinking my americno and eating my continental breakfast, I wish you were breaking bread with me on this rainy Wednesday morning because there's something I desperately need to tell you; that for the first time ever, I know exactly why I am here and exactly what I am supposed to be doing with my life; I have realized my path. I was beginning to wonder if this would ever be and had resigned to the fact that I might be an eternal wanderer who has a lot of likes, but no true intended path. Now I know differently; that I have been called to do something amazing, or at least I think so. This realization has brought a sense of calm and peace to me that I have never known as well as a sense of anxiety and stress over these new intense feelings of pressure to live up to my destiny and be in the world in the way that I am meant to be. I want to say all of these words to you because I know you would understand and be more elated for me than another human will ever be and in my future moments of self doubt, would push me forward from behind and keep me on the path I'm supposed to be taking. I am working to find peace in the knowledge that while you may not be here in physical presence, in most moments, I know what you would say to me, I can still hear your words floating around out there somewhere, everywhere.
But I suppose in the end, this realization of my intended path in life, only came as a result of your death as well as other obstacles I have faced in my life. It is indeed true that that which does not kill you makes you stronger and the clarity of sight which your death has brought to me is at times astounding. I think while not here in presence calling me to dinner, or putting cream cheese on my bagel for me, or waving to strangers with me in your convertible, your spirit is working it's magic in my life just as it did in your presence and when I am with the spirit of life or god or whatever the hell people want to call it/him/her, which in reality, I always am, I am with you as well. And as much as it can hurt that I can no longer see you or hear your voice, it brings peace that on this mothers day week over five years after your body left this place, to know that you indeed, are still right here inside of me.
