I believe them. I have to. It’s still pretty raw.
Oh, most days are fairly normal. Work. Writing. Television
and reading. Walks and yardwork. Occasional housework (the advantage of living
alone is that nobody sees the dustbunnies but me). I don’t talk about her; I
don’t cry. Mourning takes a backseat to normal life.
But I still have the flashbacks, the sudden waves of sorrow
that catch me off guard. So I retreat. Refocus. And re-emerge. All part of the
journey.
Sometimes I indulge in the what-ifs:
“What would she be like at 32 had she been ‘normal’”?
“What career would she have chosen?”
“Would we have had a good relationship?”
“How would she have fit into my life at this point?”
“Should I have had a second child?”
“Would I be a grandmother?”
Indulgent, but strangely less painful and easier now than
when she was alive. That may be the writer in me. But I don’t dwell there too
long. Too easy for such thoughts to re-wound, make the edges raw again.
Those stages of grief, those well-known ones? Yeah, they’re
true, but they’re aren’t as linear as some would have you think. You don’t move
easily from one stage to the next. You volley back and forth like a ping-pong
ball, sometimes making progress. Sometimes not. The hardest stage?
Acceptance. Because it’s the hardest to hang on to.
Birthdays make it hard. Hers. Mine. Her father’s.
But we go on. Because I believe with my whole heart—and my “hole”
heart—that I will see her again someday. And she’ll answer all of my “what ifs,”
even if the answers won’t matter anymore.
Happy birthday, Rachel. I still celebrate you.
