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Friday, April 13, 2007

Home Again

The phone rang this morning and woke us up.  TDO stumbled to the phone (I couldn’t reach it, as I was firmly sandwiched between TDO and Jenica) and I heard (vaguely) a female voice and TDO said, “Nono, it’s okay, we have to get up soon, anyhow.  Did you wanna talk to Lib?“  It was the same conversation he’s had dozens of times before with my mom, so for the span of half a heartbeat, I thought it was my mom calling.

Of course, it wasn’t.

Everything came slamming down at that point, like a rock slide of emotions, like the crashing of dreams on the shores of reality.  Oh.  Yeah.  My mom’s dead.  She’s not coming back.  She’s never calling me again.  It’s over.  It’s done.  There are no do-overs, there’s no reset button, and there’s no one last chance.  It’s just.  Done.  Everything.  Her life, which looking back, doesn’t seem all that great or happy.  Our relationship, which was, at least toward the end, extremely strained and at least for me, disappointing. 

I so badly want to find out more about her last minutes, but I know it’s stressful for my sister to talk about what she knows.  My step-brother was there with my dad when they asked her if she wanted to be taken off the ventilator.  I want to know how that conversation went.  Some of it is morbid curiosity, more than that, though, is this deep need to know - beyond a doubt - this is what my mom wanted.  Why?  I mean, it’s too late to worry about it now. 

I’m so hurt that I didn’t get to say goodbye. 

Most of the trip was fairly miserable.  I kept wondering why the hell I bothered to even go.  It cost me a small fortune in money we didn’t really have.  We didn’t do a funeral service because of time and money constraints.  My sister handled arrangements and emotions efficiently and effectively.  My dad just wanted to be left alone to do his own thing and had no interest in being around anyone, much less me.  My uncle and sister were both gracious in letting Bastian and I stay with them, but, it was… odd.  I felt very much like we were imposing.  I felt very much out of place.  I felt.  Lost.  Sometimes, when I’ve gone back “home” to visit, I’ve felt like a ghost: invisible and insubstantial.  This time, I felt like an outsider, someone visiting a grieving family.  I felt like someone my sister “used to know” more than her sister who was also grieving and a part of the process.

It was nice seeing friends.  I wish there had been more time, more space, more allowance for visiting.  It was interesting seeing my old high school and middle school.  It was good to walk through the streets of Manitou peeking and poking at all the little shops.  But mostly, I just wanted to come home, to sleep in my own bed, and to take a bath with the hottest water I could manage with as many bubbles as I wanted, leaving wet towels and bath and body products strewn about however the heck I wanted without worry.

I’m glad to be back, now, well, mostly.  Now I have to throw myself into a routine I don’t care to embrace.  I have to live up to obligations I set out weeks before I had any clue any of this would happen.  I have to pretend I’m okay, that it’s okay, that the world is as it always has been.  I guess, in many ways, it is.  But for me, at least right now, it doesn’t feel like it.  Right now, I am just… lost.  I feel friends reaching out, and for that I am forever grateful.  I hear words of comfort, and while mere words can do little to balm the loss, their sincerity and intent is moving and appreciated.  But in the end, I just want my mom back.  I want her to tell me one last time that she loves me.  I want to know that I matter to her, that my existence wasn’t wasted on her, that she knew and loved me for me.  I want to know that she was proud.

I never got that in life from her.  I don’t think I will find it in her death.  The best I can hope for is to shed tears until I have no more to cry, that I can hurt until the hurt fades, and that in the end I can look inside for the validation I so desperately want, instead of outside.  Who knows if I can muster all that, but it’s about all I can hope for right now.

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In Previous Years:

2007

Anniversary Letter (2007)

TDO,

Anniversaries are complicated, aren’t they?

So much expectation, so much intent, and it feels like if you slip up or don’t do something extravagant… [Read More]

2004

A Cookbook for Sebastian

I thought “Sebastian”:http://colorfully-see-through-head.com/onceuponatime/001141.html might enjoy this cookbook.

Oh, and I figured I haven’t sent out gifties to my… [Read More]

2002

A hodge podge of mixed emotions and other wierd shit

       

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