Cobbling Grief, every new today

Last night I sat with a small armful of Romney wool, picking tiny yarrow seeds and spent flower heads, from yellow dyed locks. Edward had settled in for the night, was on his side attempting to snore when a wave of heartfelt concerns engulfed me.

Do you think she misses us like we miss her?

Is she lonely? We have each other, but she is alone. 

I miss caring for her, being there, in the hospital. Do you miss caring for her, too?

Do you think she thinks about us?

I wonder what she thinks about all this, I continued. I wish I could ask her what to do, what she thinks.

Is she sad? Was she ever sad? Did you see her cry, ever?

Grief is a clever, brilliant whiff of a thing. How it weaves itself around you, and manages to blow you into fragments of yourself. There is no touching it, it seems, yet the weight of it is all I manage to feel. 

In the past few weeks I have felt so hallow, so deeply cleaved that every morning, every today, is an exercise in gathering up the scattered fragments, and cobbling them all together for some small semblance of myself. Some mornings the gathering is rather easy, my arms are light and strong, I'm quick-witted and nimble, and I patch myself together rather well. Others find me slow and clumsy, trying to sort the pieces before I am ready to rebuild. Those are the days where I turn each memory in my hands like a mason carefully inspecting every brick, every stone before building a new road. Those days when I am most careful, most slow, most deliberate about the fragments scattered, those are the hardest of days.

The oddity is that in some way, each today is cobbled and clumsy, yet pieced into some bit of myself. And, not just myself, but ourselves, because everyone I love most dearly is grieving, too. Everyone is tinged with a bit of regret, a bite of sad, a mouthful, or rather a life-full of missing her. 

It occurs to me as I write this, the question is not whether I am cobbled together each day or not, but when and how do I scatter back into fragments. Where does my voice break today? With whom will my heart split? 

I'm an old hen, an old hand at loss and grief. Yet somehow, this life never prepared me for grieving my mom. There are so many tiny mental questions, negotiations I haven't quite figured out yet. And when I try to approach them, try to answer the questions, I break.

I don't know if I'll every speak Spanish fluently again. She was the only person alive I was fluent with.

I don't know if I'll every make Albondigas or Chile Rellenos again. She was my recipe source.

I don't know if I'll ever learn to be slow to anger. She was my mentor.

I don't know.

I don't know.

I don't know.

Yet I do. 

This morning I awoke twice. First, to the feeling of Edward wrapping blankets around me and kissing my cheek before he left to work. Second, to the sound of morning birds chirping outside my window. Each of those awakenings, I remember, are gifts from her. Let me explain. 

I have tried to describe the kind of man Edward is for twenty years--manly and strong, yet gentle and nurturing, corny and witty, light-hearted, unbothered, child-like, innocent and giving, fully loving and devoted. He is a man's man, this kind of a human, where, no matter how you turn him, no matter what light you shine on him, or where you place him--he shines. I don't say this because I carry his last name, proudly, but he is a very special person. Edward is the kind of man you are happy to have in this world--he is peaceful, calming, and so generous with his heart. And I know, I know, I've said already he is child-like and corny, but he is this surprisingly funny, easy-going kind of person. He makes you laugh with a sort of surprise, a kind of despite himself way. 

Perhaps you know what it's like to be woken by the song of birds; I pray you do. Though my bird friends can be quite mischievous, and slightly thieving in my garden, they are the song of joy. Their song whiffs in with an intent, a will of peace I only know as birdsong. It's pure, of the heavens. I often find myself thinking of one of my favorite verses when I hear them sing, 

Consider the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? -Matthew 6:26

That close connection with God, that lack of need to sow or reap, that utter dependance and abiding in God--that is their song. Spiritually, that is why all birds, whether caged or free, sing. Birds, like sheep, are rife through the Bible. Personally, they remind me of God's presence, of His love and care for all, His nurturing of all life.

Edward is fully his mother's son. He is so much of her--nurturing, loving, strong, corny and witty, light-hearted, devoted, peaceful, kind. So many adjectives it reads as though I am stringing together pearls of cliches to adorn simply for the feel or sound of it. But she was all of those many things and more, and he got those things of her. 

The off the cuff silly jokes. The ability to join into laughter whether he knows the joke or not. 

I often tell people I knew I wanted to marry Edward when I realized I wanted my son to know him, to be like him, to have him as a role model. I remember thinking, what a man, I want my son to grow up to be just like him.

Here I am, twenty years later, learning that not only did I want my son to be like him, but that he was because of her, and I want to be like her. 

Fun-loving and light. Selfless and loving. Courageous and brave. Ironclad faith.

In the two months she (knowingly) lived with cancer we lived our very best lives. We weren't galloping around the world in airplanes or trains, seeing places or buying things. We weren't auditing bank accounts or counting what possessions would remain, and who will take them. We weren't talking what-ifs, why me's, or asking why God.

We were praying. We were laughing. We were holding hands. We were sitting quietly. We were listening to the birds sing. We were walking hospital halls arm and arm. We were talking. We were hugging. We were loving. We were joyful for sunshine. We were faithful. We were prayerful. We were together. We were peaceful. We were joking. We were love.

One of my pastors came to the hospital and prayed for us in the very early days, the day after the first and only chemo. After we prayed bedside, he took me and Edward to the hall, his wife crying though she didn't know mom, held our hands and told us, "this will be the hardest, but most important thing you will do in your life." 

Jim told us that though it will be painful, and at times will feel impossible, trust that it will be a gift, and perhaps the greatest comfort and blessing to our lives. He encouraged us to stay the course, to steady ourselves in faith, to be present and to continue through as we were. 

When I wake up twice to fragments of her--her son, the birds she told me she'd fly with--when I wake to the legacy she left me of being Mrs. Jimenez, of being wife to her son, mother to her grandkids, daughter to her beloved, kin to her family, when I wake to the life she lived so fully, so fervently and passionately with faith and joy, when I wake earthside, without her, without having the honor to care for and nurture her during her transition, without her corny jokes, without her laugh, without her hand in mine--I find it impossible to see the gift, yet, like grief, she is clever, a brilliant kind of a woman. She weaves herself around me, us, and manages to blow into us fragments of herself. There is no touching her, it seems, yet the weight of her is all I manage to feel. 

I don't know how to live this life without her. None of us do. Not her nine brothers and sisters. Her dozens and dozens of nieces and nephews, her hundreds of cousins. Not her husband, or her sons. Her grandchildren. Not her friends. Not her birds. Not her plants and garden. Not her home or her kitchen. 

This morning I think the point is not to figure out how to live life without her, there is no way. She is in me. In my hands when I hold Edward's hand. In my daughter's smile and the wrinkle in her nose when she's making a funny face. She's in my son's wit and humor. She's Edward's nurturing love. She's scattered in my garden, her plants and mine, getting on well this mild May. She's around my wrist in the jingle of her bracelets, which sound oddly like her laugh. She's the morning song of the birds. She's my second mama, as she told me again and again--tu eres mi hi'ja. She is in the always of love. The forever is her.

Last night, while I picked my wool and questioned Edward again and again, something I seem to need to do regularly--did we do enough, did she know how much I loved her, did I tell her every day I loved her--he was drifting in and out of sleep, but heard and responded to only one question.

Is she sad?

-No, she isn't sad, she would never be sad.

Ahh, I calmed. Ahh, I remembered who she was. I remembered her holding my hands, soothing me as I cried on her frail chest, "awww...mi'ja" she rubbed my head, don't be sad, don't cry.

She told me to look to the heavens, she'd be there, waiting for us. She'd be flying with the birds, she said, and we'd all soon be together again.

And here I am, sad, crying, yet comforted that she is flying with the birds, waiting for us to all be together again. I wonder what jokes she's telling, how many times she's had heaven in stitches, or what kind of garden she's started.

We are never lonely in the presence of the God. Never sad or forlorn. Never worried or overly pensive.

We are like the birds of the air--full of song, never sowing or reaping, but abiding in the peace and love God gives.

Every today my fragments are cobbled with the gift of her legacy. And I am so grateful she was and is.

I am so deeply grateful God gave me the time to care for her, to love on her with all I have, to be there daily, walking with her through pain. Yes because I loved her so deeply, and that's what daughters do, but because she gifted me the ability to watch God care for and love her, she gifted me the legacy of her courage and faith, as she bravely walked headfirst into God's will--though it was filled with pain and unending sickness, with grace and beauty, love and faith.

Yes, every morning, and sometimes throughout the day I have to process her death again. And, yes, I am having a rough go of it. But, also, yes, I am so fully grateful and feel her love so deeply, I am do fundamentally changed, I know peace in the heartache.

I know joy. I know love.

It is so very easy to love those born of your body, and those whose body you are born from. But what love it is to love someone so completely, so deeply that is not of your flesh. What love it is to have been loved so well, to have been so mothered, and cared for by her.

She'd tell me she got lucky with me, and I'd respond, no, I got lucky with you. We'd always be holding hands, and we'd settle on we got lucky together, with each other. 

God gives so fully in love. I pray I can be an instrument of that love, as my mom was God's song of love in my life.

May you be blessed to know love as I have. May you give it as my mom did. 

May we all laugh (and eat) with passion like her.