Sneaky

Grief is sneaky.

It's been a year and a half since my Dad died. These days, I go whole stretches when I feel pretty ok about the whole thing. Of course I miss him. I'll always miss him. But the grief doesn't feel quite so raw, and I go stretches of time when I feel like it's all relatively ok. And then...

Something set me off this weekend. I'm not even entirely sure what it was. Maybe it was the fact that Mumford & Sons released a new song, and Mumford makes me think of my Dad because when the guys went to Montana for his 70th, they listened to Mumford exclusively. Maybe it was going to brunch with my uncle (his little brother) and aunt (and many others) yesterday. Maybe it was a combination of these things.

Maybe it's that I feel him so keenly right now, because I'm getting into the weeds of my work year, with walks coming soon, and his voice is in my head almost constantly, telling me I'm doing ok, everything will be ok...

In these moments, it just hits me all over again, that I can't go to see him, get one of his renowned hugs, hear his voice somewhere other than inside my own head.

When E was one, he bought her a stuffed animal. We were out shopping for B's birthday party, and she came across a polar bear at LL Bean that she liked. We had her put it back on the shelf, but Papa snuck back and got it, and bought it for her. She thought it was a dog. We named it Bear Dog. She knows it was a gift from Papa, and it's her favorite stuffed animal. The other night when she had a bad dream, she wouldn't go back to sleep until I handed her Bear Dog to clutch.

It gets easier, I guess, for the  most part. But I still have mornings when I find myself sitting at my computer, crying for missing him.

That's the hardest part. Just missing him. I've gotten past the WHAT and WHY of it, for the most part. But the missing him never goes away.

Rough

It's been a long winter here in MA, to say the least. It seems pretty likely that we'll beat the record for snowiest winter, which is made all the more remarkable since all but around six inches of it has fallen since late January. There is currently several feet of standing snow in my yard.

So, the fact that this is taking a toll on me is certainly not unique. It's just exhausting. Everything is exhausting. For most of February, not only was there insane snow, but it was also just absolutely FRIGID. I feel like my family of four spent more time together, in our house, than we have since...maybe ever. It was A LOT of togetherness.

I tend toward S.A.D., or whatever you want to call it anyway. Winter is not my finest hour, emotionally. This is another thing B has in common with me. He gets more difficult to manage in the winter. The combination of limited outside/active time and the claustrophobic weather wears on him. And E? She just flat out hates winter. She said to me recently that she wants to move somewhere with "jungle trees" which is what she calls palm trees. Me too, little girl. ME. TOO.

In addition to this, I started full time at work in January. So, what would already have been an exercise in juggling has become even more so in light of the weather. It's just been a lot, all at once. Add to that my usual propensity for convincing myself that I'm not doing well enough at work, or that I'm going to screw up massively...I've been a barrel of laughs lately.

B's attentional issues, which I think I've mentioned in passing before, have come increasingly to the fore, now that he's getting older. They've really come to a head this winter. This comes with its own array of emotions, of course. And it also makes me miss my Dad even more than usual, because my Dad had an uncanny knack for  understanding B, and for drawing him out of his bleaker moods.

Anyway, all this bleakness by way of saying, I AM SO READY FOR SPRING. Yes, I'm sort of terrified for spring, since my job becomes even more hectic and stressful in spring...but spring is also when I get to go to the walks and see the awesome families, and it's going to be so worth the stress.

And spring will allow this ADHD (not officially diagnosed yet, but headed that way) guy of mine to get outside and expend the extra energy. To yell. To whoop. To do all the things that are such a relief for him. And it'll lessen his screen time in a more organic way than my constantly harranguing him to shut it down.

I hope this post didn't sound as negative as I think it probably did. Things around here are not bad. They're actually pretty great, all things considered. It's just that, sometimes, come late winter, I need to take to my blog and just VENT, in order to reset my positivity toward the better things on the horizon. Like sunshine. And the beach. Ooh, and rose. Ok. I feel better now. Hope you do, too.

Spectrum of Love

This blog used to be about me being a new Mom. Remember that? Before I got all navel gazey? Those were halcyon days.

I'm still a Mom. Just not so new at it these days. Although, rest assured, motherhood finds new ways to surprise, shock and stump me on the daily.

One of the more fascinating (to me) things about motherhood is the very individual ways I can feel for my children. Of course, I knew that, as individual beings, they would inspire different things in me. But it's still so interesting to feel that as it happens.

With B, everything is fierce. I love, adore him fiercely. When I'm angry with him, when he drives me bananas, when he frustrates me down to my very soul, that's fierce. My fears regarding him are fierce. He takes a match to my world on a daily basis. And I wouldn't have it any other way.

With E, it's gentler. She inspires in me such a calmer, mellower sentiment. She softens me - my moods, my heart. And it's not that I don't have fears for her - she's a girl, they come with a whole set of fears unique to them, right? It's just that my fears for her feel different, too. She herself is a reassuring presence. Maybe it's a second born thing, maybe it's that she's the pregnancy that made it after the one who didn't...I'm not sure. But she reassures me where her brother terrifies me. It makes me grateful.

Of course, being a very dramatic 7 year old, B will occasionally drop the "You love her more!" bomb on me. And my answer to him is the same very true answer my Mom gave me when I dropped that one on her as a child, "I don't love her more. I may love her differently, because you are two different people, but it's not more or less."

Looking back, I think that message from my Mom was really important. Learning early in life that love takes many forms, and that love in all its forms is valuable, is a lesson with value beyond the nuclear family. But it's also reassuring for a child to know that different does not mean lesser, when it comes to a parent's love.

Christmas and Magic and...Existentialism?

The middle Saturday of December was most always Coop Santa Saturday - the day when my Dad was Santa in the Harvard Coop children's book area. I know I've written about it before. It was one of my favorite days of the year. We would all go and get our Santa fix, and then the whole big group of us would invade The Border Cafe for lunch afterward.

I was thinking of this today as I ran errands with my kids. I was missing my Dad, wishing we could've had more Coop Santa days. I was thinking I should've made plans with my sister to go to the Border today, to celebrate the memories. Something.

As I was thinking all of this as I drove Route 9 West, "Gone, Gone, Gone" by Philip Phillips came on the radio. This is the song that I associate with the days right after my Dad died. I kept hearing it at uncanny moments in those early days, and it started to feel like a message from him. Those of you who knew my Dad know that it was SO his sense of humor to use a song that repeats the words, "Like a drum, my heart never stops beating," as a message immediately after dying of a heart attack. At the time, I remember thinking, "HA HA. Real funny, Dad."

Anyway, it came on the radio today, literally as I was thinking about him and Coop Santa and all of that, and naturally I burst into tears. His absence is sharper around Christmas...which, I guess you'd expect with a guy who actually WAS Santa. I haven't had as difficult a time getting into the spirit this year as last, but that doesn't mean I haven't had several break downs. I have. Grief evolves and changes, but I don't necessarily think it ever actually goes away.

Likewise, almost fifteen years to the day after my grandfather died, I had a dream this week in which I had a rather profound conversation with him. That was pretty cool.

I know there are so many people out there who would tell me all this stuff is just coincidence. But to me, that seems like missing out on all the cool stuff.

Sucker Punching...Myself

This is the place where I'm brutally honest (Not that I'm not normally...I tend toward overshare in general, if anything). About my feelings. About my foibles and flaws. And about my fears. Which are many.

I know I've discussed it before, but it's ongoing, so here we are. I have an issue with feeling...competent. With feeling good enough. This manifests itself in various ways, none of which are fun. Mainly, I have a really, really hard time forgiving myself for any mistake or misstep. Which is unfortunate because I am a DECIDEDLY human person, who can be flighty and forgetful. So, mistakes are...you know, de rigeur. But I pass up nary an opportunity to beat myself up over them.

Recently, I made a mistake at work. I fixed it and it turned out ok, and my coworker told me repeatedly not to worry about it, but I'm still slapping myself silly over it. And there is this little voice in the back of my head that keeps taunting, "See? It was just a matter of time, you dolt," and other super helpful things like that. I've gotten a lot better at ignoring that voice, for the most part, but that doesn't mean it's completely gone away. And something interesting occurred to me, as a result of it. One of the things my coworker said was, "We've all made mistakes like this." And I realized that in all my years at the old gig, NO ONE had ever said that to me, even though it was true there, too. Mistakes were so verboten in that environment that no one could ever commiserate, for fear of admitting their own mistakes.

Also, I recently discovered that something I thought I'd done, related to E's school, I probably somehow missed doing. I'm not sure whether I forgot something, or whether it got lost, or what. Stuff happens, you know? And it's not something that's a big deal, and it's something that I can re-submit. But BOY have I been having a field day, berating myself...which of course means I assume whatever went screwy was my fault. But that vicious little voice is back, too, telling me that the others in the group are going to think I'm an idiot, and will, as a result, not like me.

This is another thing that little voice does. I guess it's related to feeling not good enough, right? This feeling that people won't like me? It's a dichotomy within my personality - I'm a really social person. I love people. All kinds of people. Short of being downright mean, you're pretty much not going to find a way to get me not to like you. And yet, I CONSTANTLY fear that people won't like me. Believe me, I know how pitiful that sounds.

I remember having a conversation with a friend about 10 years ago, wherein I bemoaned my being so socially awkward. He looked at me like I was talking utter nonsense and said, "YOU? You're socially awkward? No. You're friendly and hilarious and warm. You're about the last person I would call socially awkward." I was legitimately gobsmacked. Granted, that was one person's opinion - one person who had known me for several years by then and was a good friend. But still.

As y'all know, it's a mantra of sorts, reminding myself that I'm a work in progress. It also helps to remind myself that you get back what you put out. And I strive to be the kind of person, mother, wife, friend, coworker, that I would want to have around me. And for the most part, I am. So, that little meanie in the back of my head and go kick rocks, because she is totally full of it. And I am a positive person, so her negativity is not welcome here.

A Room of One's Own

My senior year in college was the first time I ever had my own room. Said room, in the upstairs of a student apartment in Puffton Village, Amherst, was about the size of my walk-in closet. It. Was. TINY. But it was mine. Just mine. And as much as I loved sharing a room with my sister, which I did so much that I sobbed when she moved out of the house, and in fact, still considered the room we'd shared "ours" not "mine," having a space that was just mine was amazing to me. So, the tininess of the room didn't bother me much. I did so much growing up in that room. I changed more in that single year than I probably have during much longer chunks of my life.

I wrote my thesis in that room. I wrote prolific, if not very good, poetry. I read more books than I could count. Books that changed my life. And through much of it, I listened to the advance copy of Ani DiFranco's Little Plastic Castle that my Dad had given me when it was sent to the Coop's record department. It's still among my all time favorite albums. Hardcore Ani devotees would probably argue that it's among her more commercial endeavors and that it's not actually her best work. Yea. I could not possibly care less. That album signifies something so special and personal to me that it's about more than the music.

Having a sanctuary is an amazing thing. That tiny bedroom in Puffton was that for me. It was a place where I felt more myself than I'd felt since before my thyroid collapse. It was a safe place. If I could go back and spend a night in that little room, I totally would. I would love to be able to go back and check out all the candles and posters and tapestries and collages, many of which I'm sure I've forgotten over the years. It's not that I would trade my life now for my life then, not a chance, but I'd love to be able to visit.

And I think that, although the girl sitting in that room, writing furiously while listening to Ani would be surprised at some of the turns my life has taken (and probably disgusted that I'm not a best-selling author yet), that she would be really relieved to hear that I finally found "him" and that we are a team and that we have B&E and a home we love. She wouldn't be as shocked as I wish she would to hear that Dad is gone, although she would be no less devastated for it. She would be so stoked to hear about all the amazing things her siblings and friends have done in the intervening years.

What got me thinking about all of this? A pop up ad showed up on a site I was on yesterday, advertising an Ani DiFranco show in Concord, NH. The promo picture of Ani was...surprising. She kind of looked like someone I might have a glass of wine and chat with. And it's not that I haven't seen a picture of her in the last 15 years, I have. The transition from combative, dread-locked youngster to folk music veteran has been gradual, of course. Just like my transition from shy poet in Docs and cords to Mom in skinny jeans and boots. We all change. We all evolve. But staying in touch with past versions of ourselves is such an important part of that, to me.

48

Forty eight years ago today, a 23 year old man and a 21 year old woman got married. They went on to have five children and a marriage full of ups, downs, and an abundance of love.

Most of what I know about love I learned from them. My parents didn't always get along. In fact, I'm not sure how compatible they even were, on paper. But they were each other's true soul mates. Their love and attraction for one another remained alive, even when they were ready to tear each other's hair out.

From a pretty early age, I dreamed of finding a man who would look at me the way my Dad looked at my Mom. Through their entire forty seven year marriage, he would look at her, and then look at you, like, "Seriously, though, can you believe I landed her? I can't." She drove him absolutely bananas. His nickname for her was Pesty, which speaks volumes. One of my favorite quotes of his was, "You're gonna discover...your mother's a real PUSHER." But it was exactly the things about her that drove him nuts that drew him in. Her energy and drive was such a fantastic foil for his natural tendency toward procrastination and sedentary ways.

And my Mom adored my Dad. He drove her absolutely bananas, too. His office was literally a waking nightmare for her. And his inability to keep the top of his dresser clear, like, EVER, made her want to move out, sometimes. But when she watched him with a baby or child, or when she was cold and snuggled up to him, the tenderness that washed over her face was unmistakable.

Over the past year, as she's mourned him, I've been continually impressed by her unique ability to mourn, yet to keep on keeping on. She misses him. One hundred percent of the time, she misses him. But she goes on. She is strong, amazingly strong. It's one of the things he loved most about her.