December 23, 2011
Christmas Eve is tomorrow.
I thought if I could keep myself busy, everything would be ok this year.
There is no busy enough.
I miss you.
I miss you.
I miss you.
The presents are all wrapped, including the one I bought myself. Getting ready to write cards to go with everything all those memories of holidays past have hit me.
I am an undecorated snowwoman melting one tear at a time.
Here, alone in my house , Enya’s Christmas album in the back ground I am filled with thoughts of you. How did this happen?
How did I get here to this eve of Christmas Eve with Sadie sleeping at my feet, Stella a live cat rug in front of the fireplace?
Steve will be here soon. I do not want him to see me crying. But I am afraid I cannot stop. My body quakes with sorrow.
Breathe. I can breathe.
This will pass.
I know that now.
So the greatest gift I can give myself this year is time to let grief be. To allow myself these memories of you.
Christmas Eve 1981. I place the palm of my hand on my stomach, the place my womb used to be. I remember my belly stretched round with you. Your head cradled in my pelvis. Knees, elbows rolling across my abdomen. Feet poking me in the ribs.
Silent night.
Mary was a mother just like me. Whether you believe in Jesus Christ or God or not, she was a mother who cradled her baby boy in her arms, fed him at her breast. She was a mother who watched her newborn baby sleeping at night, checked to make sure he was breathing. She was a mother who watched her son roll over, sit, say his first work, walk. She fed him, bathed him, clothed him, worried over him. She watched him grow into a man.
Holy night.
All is calm.
The calm before the storm.
Did she know?
The summer before you died I felt it in my bones.
I knew.
I am trying to remember the rest of the song. “Silent night, holy night, all is calm, all is bright.”
Frustrating. I cannot remember the rest of the words.
I close my eyes. Keep singing. It is hard to sing and cry.
“Silent night, holy night…”
A child is born that will die and leave his mother heartbroken. This is all I can think of.
The rest of the words. I remember them. And then I get to the last sentences.
"Sleep in heavenly peace.
Sleep in heavenly peace."
Breathe. Just breathe.
Merry Christmas Andrea.
I love you. That is my gift this Christmas.
Mom
