Griefaries: Eight

January 29, 2023 

I was in the shower, rinsing myself off underneath the nearly too-warm water, when I suddenly got a writing idea.  This has not happened to me in quite some time, but when it does, it never fails to arrive at the most inconvenient time - when I'm half asleep, driving, taking a shower, at work, etc.  Nine times out of ten I will not be able to jot down the idea that floods my brain in full.  If I'm lucky, I will remember it long enough to where I'm awake, parked, my hands are dry, all the kids are asleep, etc., and then I can make it permanent somewhere.

The rather lucky and unlucky scenario that happened to me in that shower, was that I didn't forget the prompt.  But I'm certain that's because the initial prompt only prompted even more thoughts, which flashed my brain with traumatic images, which made the remainder of that shower feel simultaneously like two seconds and two days had passed.

When thoughts like this intrude so suddenly, it can also be very difficult for me to think of anything other than them.  I do not have positive material queued up in my brain to help offset the traumatic thoughts, because I did not know I was about to be thinking these thoughts.  That's a very powerful, and not always discussed, part of grief - the imagery in the memories.  At least for me it is.  Everyone's grief journey looks completely different. 

I assume you're sticking around to hear the prompt.  I will not give it all away, because I do still have a dream to one day finish writing, and maybe even publish, a novel.  But to give you the sparknotes version - always tell people how you feel before it's too late.

When this prompt came to me, I immediately envisioned these characters that I have, for quite some time up to this point, completely ignored.  However, at this moment, in the strange way that my mind works, I could have sworn I could see these fictional people right behind my eyelids.  The whole thing acting itself out without my conscious say-so.

As quickly as it came, it left, leaving behind traumatic visions and mouthed words spoken to a vast sky that could care less.  Traumatic visions with closed mouths and a numb soul.  Traumatic visions and words being screamed into ears that can no longer hear them.

These are nightmares for me.  It is not a simple feeling that I can act upon with a quick text or a friendly lunch date.  These are suffocated words.  They have been caught in my throat for over two years.  They go nowhere, and will never leave, because no matter if I say them to a thousand other people in my lifetime, they will never be to her.  I will always have unspoken words trapped within me.  Words my momma deserved to hear a million times over in our mere 22 years together.  But I was too late.  When it mattered the most, when she was physically leaving this earth behind for the great beyond, she did not get to hear from me.  I had missed her call.  And when I finally heard her voicemail, it was only after my aunt and uncle frantically woke Heather and I and brought us to the rest of our lives - the hospital.  

She was gone by the time covid protocols allowed more than one visitor inside, and to this very moment I thought I had all the time in the world.  I'm sure I've said this in one of my many other posts, but mom was not a stranger to hospital walls.  By default, neither was I.  I thought she'd just be laying in that bed, the breathing tube helping her to breathe as the social worker had literally said, and she'd be home in no time, just like every time.  No.  I've never experienced another one of my parents die, thankfully, but I did experience my mom's death right before me.  I figured out that her machines were black and silent.  That nothing connected to her useless breathing tube.  That she was no longer there, even though she was right there.

I said "no" more than I said "I love you."  More than I said "please don't leave me."  More than I said "I'm not done needing you, please come back to me."  No, I just said "no."  A lot.  Like a lot a lot.  And I also cried a lot.  That same amount of dread and sadness still lives within me today.  I feel it right now as I reminisce, not only on this most painful day, but every single day that has followed.  

Life has felt so incredibly fictitious at times.  The cheesy form of fiction that is so predictable, and yet impossible to put down.  Only I would very much like to put all of this weight down.  To put these feelings of hopeless guilt somewhere beyond, or far far below, or way up in the stratosphere.  To put my words into the ears of my mother again.  To see her.  To feel her hugs.  To drive her ridiculous van to Grand Haven once more.  To do everything we've ever done once more.  To have more memories.  To have less heartache.  To have less sicknesses and ailments.  To be able to LIVE.

Momma, I wish you were able to live while you were alive.  I hope that I'm able to again someday as well.  To live harmoniously with the joy and the suffering.  Maybe to even make up for some of the life you lost.

I'm still not sure how to without you.  Even after almost 2 1/2 years without you, nothing has gotten any easier.  I have not gotten smarter without your guidance.  Except now I am smart enough to know that anyone who claims that the passing time will heal me knows absolutely nothing about immeasurable loss such as yours.

In some ways I pity them their lack of knowledge, because it feels almost like they lack such a deep love.  But maybe all it means is they have yet to lose that deep love.  And I envy them that.

So even though your ears are nowhere close to me now, and even though typing that out sent my mind on a traumatic imagery spiral, I would like to say this, even though I've lost my chance - I love you to the stars and beyond.  I hope your stardust is dancing freely with the rest of the stardust in the sky.  I can't wait to dance like we're on Dancing With the Stars when I meet you there some day.

<3 Sarah