What is there to say first of all else? There are so many things on top and underneath of each other and I am afraid to reach down and take just one of them up in case I suddenly have to look them all head on; eye to eye and face to face. No, I am not strong enough to really confront the thoughts I have about my 29 years and my mom’s 52. At least not anymore than a child who reaches out and dares to quickly run a finger through a candle flame - -they know that to keep their hand still would mean they’d be burned. So I don’t want to keep my hand in one place. I am not even fascinated with the flame. But I do want to brave for my mom. I want to not be so far away, because she goes to all these appointments all by herself and I just think it’s so lonely as it is to suddenly one day be left alone with a disease that won’t tell you where it’s taking you. I want to get in the car and drive with her. And I want so badly for her to know how beautiful she is. I want to talk more to my sister . . .
But it’s hard not to keep it all at a distance. Because it’s just so close. I remember last year when the seriousness of it was told to just the oldest of the kids and (I think it was a couple days later) that I put my head down on my desk and sobbed and sobbed. You know, I don’t know where things like this go inside of us. Because how can we carry something that seems so much heavier and bigger than we are? I don’t know how and I just pray that somehow I can reach down to that deepest place and know that I’m not going drown. Know that I can find my mom’s hand and hold it.
I will write other things next time. I feel like I’ve just turned on a washing machine inside myself. I am remembering and thinking about so many things: my dad crying at Christmas and saying how he didn’t even want to think about the possibility of there being a time when my mom wasn’t there, this Patti Griffin song that makes me so sad and cry and think of my mom, Patrick, my husband, saying that life is hard, how happy it makes me to read the things my mom is writing. Not everything can be said all at once. Wait for the feelings to find the words.
Naomi (2nd oldest, 1st daughter)
