You know, it's funny. So many things are funny. I have had an urge to write so many times this past week. About all the things that are funny. And strange. And confusing.
I had an interesting day today. I kept my cool in a way I have not been able to before with my four year old. For almost two hours, I stayed calm while he flailed around, feeling his way through his life, through his experience, his day, his emotions. Directing his frustration at me. And I stood like a polished marble wall, let is all slide right off. Instead of like the velcro ball I can be so often, holding onto his fit. Or like a spider web, catching his tantrum and holding it up. At the same time, I was able to love him and be patient and walk through it beside him and we both came out the other end, calm and exhausted. I lay next to him in his bed as he settled himself for a nap. Moving my hand over his hair, remembering the way my mom used to move her hand over my hair, so gently. Placing my hand on his little shoulder. Sending him love and healing thoughts through my palms. Then we both slept.
I read somewhere recently, something about how a hug can express things we cannot say. I felt today, when I was hugging my husband, like my heart was speaking to his heart. I have a feeling that my heart has been very careful since my mom died. When I was in college, I had a boyfriend. We used to stare into each others eyes. Just very much in love, looking into each others eyes, smiling, for minutes at a time, quietly being in love and settling into each other. For some reason, that memory of that feeling stands out to me as a feeling of abandon. Being in love. That falling feeling, the falling in love, letting yourself fall and drifting, following it completely.
After my mom died, that boyfriend and I broke up. And I don't think I ever looked at anyone that way again. It is only recently in my life, that I have been able to spend time gazing into my husband's eyes, before I have to look away. I think after my mom died, I suddenly understood something. There are no guarantees and everything ends. You can love someone but you should also be prepared to lose them. And I think, I lost the desire to lose myself in love that way. I sort of ended up loving in a way that was a bit guarded. A careful kind of love.
But every once in a while, that veil slips away. Today, holding onto my husband, I felt a great, full, whole sort of love, including the conscious awareness that someday he will be gone. I felt the great sadness of missing him in his future absence. A wild and clutching sort of "don't leave me" feeling, welling up and taking hold of me and in turn, him. My heart reached out and held onto his for dear life. I don't know. The funny thing is, it doesn't sound like a good feeling, but it felt honest. It felt like the truth and I felt grateful for the feeling and for this person in my life. Love is a scary thing sometimes. Because it feels so important, and necessary, and big, and at the same time, so fragile.
Later, we stood in the kitchen and talked about that hug. I told him, I had felt sad that some day he would be gone. He smiled at me and said he was not going anywhere. That's what my mom said, I told him. Before she died, when she knew she was dying, I told her how much I would miss her and that I didn't want her to go. She said, "Where would I go?" And maybe she is still here, beside me. But her physical presence is what my heart and my body misses. Two of my husband's fingertips rested on my hand as he spoke to me, grinning about his immortal self. I could weep thinking of those two fingertips not existing anymore. But this is life. Life ends. And until you experience losing someone you love, it may seem.... like a light and airy idea. But oh, the body, and all of the love it holds, the energy it radiates, the way a body feels, it's warm skin, it's soft hair, the lines and creases, the moles and freckles, the tiny hairs, the fuzz, the eyes, the teeth, their breath, their hair, their scent, the weight of them, the gravity, their feet planted on the earth, their hand in your hand, their voice, their laughter, their fingertips on your hand.... these things are golden, precious in every way. And when they are gone, they are gone. The love I feel, includes the knowledge of how fleeting these things are. How temporary. How lovely. How missed they will be. And my heart is bigger for it. I love you now. I miss you already. I am grateful for this moment of feeling you here with me and at the same time, a little sad that it will be gone some day.
I was driving in my car tonight, by myself, listening to a David Sedaris audio book. I laughed out loud and it sounded so much like my mother's laugh. But it wasn't her laugh, it was mine. Still, things like that can take my breath away and make my heart skip a beat. Maybe a little bit of my mother lives in my laugh. Certainly some of my mother lives on in me, in my body. It's funny. And sad at the same time. And I suppose some of my mom, and me, and my husband live on in my little boy. I hope they both outlive me. I hope we all grow to be very old. And I hope, by the time I die, I am less attached to this physical world and it's warm bodies. And it's ice cream. And pizza. I already miss pizza.
