Missing You

A year ago I wrote about Thanksgiving (Giving Thanks)--how it has always been my favorite holiday, how the traditions and the family and the food and the memories all wind together like a big pumpkin-colored ribbon, melding into one giant memory of food and smells and laughter and tears.  I talked about how different our Thanksgiving was in 2018, but we still celebrated it, giving thanks for the decades of memories and laughter we had experienced with family, but realizing that it would, more than likely, be the last Thanksgiving Day we would break bread with my parents.  I was right.  Ten days later, you died at home, and six months after that, your wife went to join you.  So for me, this is the first Thanksgiving in 64 years that I have not spent with, eaten with, or at least talked and laughed with, you, my dad. And I miss you.  So much that the food I just ate just sits in my stomach like a giant rock. 

As I watched the preparations and the kids' craft session, and smelled the turkey and the stuffing and the pies all baking, as family and friends arrived and filled the kitchen and the house with laughter and joy and stories, as the wine flowed and the gravy was passed, as the dishes were dirtied and washed and dirtied and washed again, I heard your laughter, saw your face, felt your hand on my shoulder as you said, "Damn it, Barb, I love you."  And I missed you, so much it was palpable, and the tears would just start to flow and I would have to run to another room or go outside just to get away and not have to talk about it.   Ben cooked up the gizzards the way you like them, but they just sat in a bowl on the counter because you aren't here to jokingly fight over who is going to get the bigger piece. I ate one, but it wasn't the same. We had turkey and stuffing and sweet potatoes and mashed potatoes, cranberries and rolls and green bean casserole, and the pie is still to come, but without your raucous laughter and comments about how this turkey was the best ever,  how no one knows how to slice turkey right except you, it wasn't the same. David is wearing your 90th birthday T-shirt from five years ago, and I spoke to Uncle Rob a few minutes ago, but I kept feeling like I was forgetting something, that there was a crucial part I was missing.   

You, Dad.  

I miss you.

Yes, I am thankful.  Yes I am blessed with so many countless blessings and riches.  I revel in the joy and love of my daughters and their husbands, my brother and my husband, my grandchildren near and far.  We have so much, so much more than I will ever deserve.  But I will always, always, miss you on this day more than any other time of year.

For you, above all, taught me the importance of family and love and memories made together.

And for that I am thankful.

Happy Thanksgiving, Dad.

Celebration of A Life

Celebrate a life.  Prepare for death.  But celebrate life.

Too many times I celebrate me, or things, or achievements, and I forget to celebrate life.  I get all bogged down in life’s distractions and details and I forget to celebrate life.  About a month before she died, Sheila told me "Barb, I just don't want a big formal mass like your dad had, with everyone all awkward and sad and crying and all quiet.  I want everyone to be together, to remember me and your dad, to be joyful.  I want it to be a beautiful, happy occasion.  We have had way too many sad moments over the past couple of years".  And that is why we’re all here.  To celebrate a life well lived, to rejoice in our sadness and loss because it means we loved deeply.    And perhaps, hopefully, to stop and breathe and celebrate this gift of life our God has bestowed on us.

About a month after my dad died, Sheila finally acknowledged she was really, truly sick, and had been for some time.  Over the next five months, I spent a lot of time with her, nearly weekly in person, and at least twice a day on the phone.  I was there with her when she got the awful diagnosis of cancer, and held her hand as the doctor told her "if you do nothing, you have 3-6 months to live."  He was wrong.  She’d already lived her life.  Fully and without reservation. Now, she had the chance to prepare for the end of her life--he was just too much of a coward to say it.  He knew it.  I knew it.  And I know now that Sheila knew it.   For the next 12 weeks Sheila and I handled minuscule details and talked about the past, and how much we missed Dad.  And although she was frightened, and in a lot of pain, and trying to hold onto life, in actuallity she was relieved and looking forward to being with her husband again.  We would go out for dinner and margaritas and not even think about calories, and we would eat ice cream for lunch and consume an entire box of chocolate covered cherries while we watched Pawn Stars or Animal Planet.  We would cry, and laugh, and get angry, and fret, but all along, we both know what was coming.  We spoke about God and family and forgiveness and heaven and sins and holiness and if we would be found wanting when it was our time to be judged.  All facades and silly trappings fell away, and if I brought up anything about past hurts or misunderstandings, she'd bluntly tell me, in her own straightforward way, "Bullshit.  Let it go."  I think that pretty much sums up how she lived her life for  78 years.  Letting all the trivial stuff go.  

Sheila was quiet but had a way of getting your attention when it was important.  She was the most honest person I've ever known, and would never compromise her beliefs or her values for expediency or popularity.  And she loved with her entire being.  She had a way of getting along with anyone and bringing out the best in people, and helping others see themselves how she saw them, and, more importantly, how they could grow.  She married the love of her life, and never wavered in that love, and took on a ready-made family of five children without even a moment's hesitation.  She was devoted to her mom, her siblings, and all of us, and she was the glue that held us all together.  She saw through every crazy teenage lie I told her, and let me know that she knew the truth without saying a word, and without blowing my cover.  She helped me through trials, rejoiced with me when I rejoiced, and was always there to offer common-sense advice about marriage, parenting, grand parenting, and life.  Sheila was just the kind of mom who you wanted to please, who you wanted to make smile and laugh, and above all, the person you wanted in your corner for every step along the way.  She loved all her step kids as if they were her own, and adored her grandchildren and later her great grandchildren, and she made all of us feel as if we were her "favorite."  (Of course, everyone knows that I am THE favorite).  She impacted our lives in so many ways. I’ll miss her always, and I’ll love her always.  And I celebrate her life.  Today. Tomorrow.  Always.  Till I can join her in eternity to celebrate eternal life   

Mother's Day Musings

Mother's Day.  Ugh.  Like I've said before, my least favorite holiday.  For me, Mother's Day has always been a fake holiday, an attempt to cover up the ugliness that was there the other 364 days of the year.  Buying cards and gifts and flowers to celebrate my mom was hypocritical and unnatural and made no sense to me whatsoever.  But my sisters and I, we played the game and shored up the facade of our seemingly happy, normal life, tiptoeing around the minefield day-to-day, and searching for the perfect card with the perfect verse that would defuse some of those mines, or at least buy us time off for good intentions.  And yes, I know the saying is "time off for good behavior" but we knew we never behaved well enough for that to happen. So we just papered our relationship with our mom with lies from Hallmark and American Greetings and the FTD flower delivery guy. Not just on Mother's Day, mind you, but finding the right card on Mother's Day was always the hardest challenge--just the right amount of cuteness, stirred up with the perfect artwork, preferably with lots of purple (her favorite color), and topped with whatever amount of praise and compliments the giver could stomach.  And not too early, and NEVER late. Oh, and NEVER make the mistake of sending the mother's day card intended for your stepmom, to your crazy real mom.  

I carried that baggage into my adulthood and my own life as a mother, where I practically exuded insecurity over my value and worth as a mother, and later a grandmother.  I have gotten better at accepting my life, especially the reality that my mother could not, or would not, love me, or perhaps love anyone else; but I still hate Mother's Day.  Probably always will.  Because it celebrates the idea of the perfect mother, who does not exist.  We place moms and motherhood on this ridiculously insurmountable pedestal, as if all moms, just because they have a uterus are somehow magically endowed with all the skills and instincts and feelings needed to nurture and raise healthy, well-balanced, and grateful offspring.  Even worse, we place this burden on the shoulders of girls and young women without providing any suitable preparation or instruction, except that handed down by, you guessed it, their mothers.  Society expects, no demands, perfection from mothers, and if a mother does not fit the mold designed by society, oh well that mother is cast out, cast aside, locked up, and hated as "unnatural" and "cold."  Hollywood, television, marketing and advertising campaigns, literature, music, art...all of it depicts motherhood as some sainted, heavenly assignation bestowed as soon as a woman is given a child to nurture.  Maternal instinct, mothering, Mother Nature, Mother Teresa...all of these conjure visions of women who can soothe any ache, calm any anxiety or fear, kiss away any pain.  Mothers are saints, mothers are holy, and mothers are off limits when it comes to the blame game.  Sure, we kid around about it, make mother-in-law jokes, complain about our mom, but God help the child who tells anyone in his world that his mother was anything but "a good mom."  

No one, especially a child, wants to believe a mother is capable of harming her offspring.  No one, especially a child, has the ability to fathom the pain and angst this will wreak in the child's life.  No one, especially the child, can grasp why he is not loved when his sibling is.  No one, especially the child, can understand that the fault lies not in them, but in the mother and the expectations of society.  So the child lives in a world of fear, of hate, of self-loathing, of guilt, of conflict avoidance, of seeking to please, and in an endless quest for someone to love her as she is.  And if that child speaks up, cries out, that child is not believed.  So the child continues to live in a world of lies, of paradoxes, of confusion and contradictions, wanting his mother to love him, because the world says that is what mothers do, all the while knowing that she does not.  But he has no way to prove that, because the world, society, even those in the child's family, say this is not possible. And the child grows up believing she is at fault, she is damaged, she deserves the punishment and the hatred and only if she would try harder, be nicer, act nicer, be prettier, be a good girl, do the right things...only then would her mother love her.  

I know...pretty dark stuff.  Remember this on the next Mother's Day--that having a functioning uterus, or being given the responsibility of nurturing anything, especially a small human being, does not automatically qualify one to nurture.  Bad mothering lies not just in the lap of the mothers--it belongs to all of us.  Mothers do not have some supernatural power or instinct that is born into them, or implanted in them when they give birth. Mothers need guidance and love and understanding and more guidance and more love.  Mothering is painful and difficult and joyful and excruciatingly sad and anxiety-filled and so many other things.  It is learning by trial and error, by practice makes imperfect, by example, and it is not easy.  It is wonderful, but it is definitely not easy.   Motherhood is one role assigned to some women, not all, and, like any other role in life, God has given us instructions to follow to be the kind of mother He designed us to be. 

My Father's Daughter

Dear Dad, 

I've worn many hats in my life--daughter, student, airman, wife, mother, nana, grandma, sister, veteran, retiree, Christian, and friend, to name just a few.  Some of those I still wear, others I have put away, and still others just plain don't fit anymore...but the one I miss wearing the most, the one that hurts every time I look at it, is being your daughter.  Not that I am no longer your daughter--that will always be a part of me.  And a very important part of me at that.  You helped make me who I am today, you shaped me and formed me, and you knew me.  

But now what?  Since you died just last month, I have experienced more emotions than I knew possible.  From raw, gut-wrenching pain, to numbness to disbelief and back to heartache.  I go through my days, my weeks, and think of you and talk about you and think I am fine, and then, BAM! I am awash in such an overwhelming sense of loss I can barely think.  I miss you, so so much--and at the weirdest, most random moments.  Today I was driving back from an appointment and was about to call you about a funny sign I saw, and to have someone to talk to (and to listen to me) on the ride home.  I activated the bluetooth and was about to press your preset speed dial on the car dash, and I stopped...suddenly realizing you wouldn't answer any more with your characteristic, sarcastic tone. No more phone calls from you telling me about your day, or how bored you were, or telling me you loved me and missed me and that my call made your day.  No more rolling my eyes at your mispronounced words and you asking over and over (and over) the same questions.  No more will I get irritated because you don't seem to understand what I am saying.  And no more swelling with joy when you'd ask me "how's my favorite daughter?"  

So yes, I am still your daughter, but now that you are gone, I feel lost, and the title of daughter just seems empty and pointless.  Because the part that made me your daughter...you...are no longer here.  And that makes me sad.  Someone once told me "you don't really feel completely grown up until you lose a parent."  True.  So very true.  Up until December 6, I was your child, your daughter, a part of you, and you a part of me.  I just never realized how important a part you were, or how much you defined me.  Until you were gone.  

A wife without a husband is a widow, a student finished with school is a graduate, but a daughter without a father?  An orphan?  

I was not ready to let go of you.  I am not ready to put away that hat, to stop being your daughter.  

I am not sure I will ever be ready.

I love you, Dad.  

Barbara