Seven Hundred Thirty Days: Year Two
There is a sense of dread I get as we leave summer and enter fall. I know the days bring me closer to reliving memories I rather not have but I can not avoid, so I prepare myself. I take necessary days off work to protect my mental wellbeing, I plan for the day, I buy a card, I steady myself.
Days like this make you question time, how could it possibly be two years when it feels like yesterday? I don’t think that will ever change. Memories are funny things, a scent, a sound, a glance, anything can bring it back without expectation.
Today was different than last year, I can’t put into words exactly how. The weather was definitely colder. In 2017, I didn’t need a jacket on November 12th or maybe I just didn’t realize I needed a jacket. There were still monarch butterflies making the migration in November 2017. There were monarch butterflies lingering around our house in November 2017. On November 6, 2017 I remember sitting outside and watching two butterflies land gently on the branches of the tree in front of our home. I remember thinking it must mean something but I wasn’t entirely sure what. At one point I convinced myself that the butterflies represented my grandma, coming to watch over my mom, her daughter. When I looked it up I found that butterflies are known to be signs that angels are close by, they are reminding you that they are present in your life, protecting and guiding you at all times.
You cling on to so much when you lose someone, you look for signs of them everywhere, or you interpret certain occurrences as proof that they are still there. Proof that they are reaching out to you, letting you know they are with you. If you don’t that’s fine, everyone grieves differently, everyone approaches death differently. I wholeheartedly believe death is something to be recognized, to be acknowledged, not shelved as a one-off instance. It is something we will all have to face. The social awkwardness around death can make grievers feel isolated in their emotions. I do think things are changing, there are more resources available for grievers but there is a long way to go.
There has never been an event that has passed in which I didn’t give my mom a card, birthday, holidays, just because. It’s what we did. When she passed that didn’t change. In fact, I bought a journal and I would write to her, I continue to write to her, letting her know how I feel, and what’s going on. I still buy cards and use them as additional pages in my journal entries to her. I encouraged my sister who was definitely not the diary, journal type to do the same because she was quiet in her grief and I didn’t want her to internalize her emotions. When mommy first passed we wrote to her and we tied it to a balloon and released it at the cemetery. This year, I bought a white balloon and we wrote our messages to her on it and left it at her memorial, we read the Daily Word which she read religiously until the very end, and we bemoaned how cold it was and how much we knew she rather us not be standing out in the cold. From the beginning my sister and I would translate an increase in the wind as our mom responding to our conversations, a gust of bitter cold wind usually meant she was telling us we had been out in the cold too long and wanted us to leave.
Grief can be unrelenting but remembrance can alleviate some of the pain we associate with grief. As I write this entry my sister is cooking and listening to Beres Hammonds, things my mom would be doing if she was still physically here with us. It’s those little things, those small moments that help get you through the not so great days. So on this 730th day of not having mommy here with us, we grieve in the best way we know how to and we continue to live every day honoring her and all she was and continues to be through us. Love you forever. Love you for always.