Another Day in the Country©
For a week now, I’ve had my daughter and grandson here from California. They are always a reminder of life on another planet.
Watching the immense changes in a 2-year-old, from even four months ago when they were here for Tim’s memorial service is amazing. Our grandson, Dagfinnr, was jabbering then —undecipherable gibberish with lots of inflection and hand motions. Now, he’s talking in sentences.
“I want pizza,” he said the other night at bedtime, “and dessert.”
He was hungry.
Watching a child grow and flourish is an amazing affirmation of life. It’s good for me in every way. I’m not sure how long it takes to mourn a loved one lost.
How long is it before the sting of death is numbed by life just going on? I think it must be measured in months. Having my loved ones around certainly helps.
There’s something about the daily discoveries of a child that are so enlivening. Last night, Dagfinnr grabbed Tooltime Tim’s cell phone off the table where it’s been setting since March. His mother was on the landline talking to his Dad.
“Halo,” Dagfinnr chirps with Tim’s phone to his ear. “I see choo-choo and big trucks.”
He giggles at what he’s doing because this phone used to be off limits. Things change.
Tim’s gone, but yet he’s not.
“Are you okay?” someone in town asked me the other day.
I knew what she meant. Was life going on after TTT’s death? Had the healing process eased the pain?
My sister asked me a similar question a couple of months ago.
“Are you mourning still?” she wanted to know. “I don’t see you doing anything different.”
There is a way that you think the universe should stop and take notice when we lose someone precious to us; but it doesn’t. That’s also the nature of life. I’m doing the same things: get up, get dressed, sit at the counter doing a Sudoku puzzle while I eat my breakfast, drink a cup of tea. I make my bed, teach a class, pay bills, sort through endless piles of things to do.
One way I know that grieving is happening in the midst of life is that I am distracted. I lay something down and can’t remember what I did with it. I have to double-check lists and keep copies of letters. It’s like I’m operating on two different levels at once and the computer’s overloaded.
While Tim was alive there were a million things to do and even in his illness there were things to watch out for, details to accomplish, a progression of crises to weather which took my attention, in some ways, away from what was actually occurring — I was about to lose someone that I loved.
In the midst of it all, I attempted to pay close attention to what it was like to have him here, to every minute and every phase and every scrap of hope. I wanted his environment, his sustenance, everywhere he looked and the air he breathed to promote healing —if not of his body, then fulfillment to his soul.
As I repeated mantras to myself and kept positive affirmations on the mirror, Tim said, “I wish I believed in that stuff.” He hadn’t had enough time in his life to really test it out — in some ways, neither have I.
I think they work, they’ve been helpful to me, I like thinking positive instead of the alternative, I feel better about life, it looks like it’s worked but perhaps my life has just been the luck of the draw or good genetics and has nothing to do with my choices. Naw, I really don’t believe that “luck of the draw” thing, but then again I can’t prove a thing.
It’s another day in the country. Tim’s billfold and cell phone are still setting where they always were on the hall table. When I see them, I’m reminded of the preciousness of every minute, every day, every experience — even loss.
A little boy in rumpled pajamas has just walked into the room where I’m writing.
“Baa-baap,” (that’s his version of Grandma) he says tugging on my arm. “I want pizza.”
“For breakfast?” I ask laughing. “You’ve got to be kidding. Even Uncle Tim wouldn’t eat pizza for breakfast.”