Chapter 31, PART 1

We can find enjoyment again. Last night, my husband and I attended a production of Jesus Christ Superstar with Tom Neely as Jesus. I watched transfixed by the beauty of the drama. Then, the crucified Christ began his last words and cried out, “Where is my mother?” Then again, “Where is my mother?” I wanted to flee the theater, crying as a flash of Logan dying alone came to me. Although my son died in his sleep, it did not matter in that dramatic moment in the theater. I felt the agony of losing a son and not being there with him when he died. This was something new and unexpected, an aspect of my son’s death that I had never thought of before.

I have not had time to analyze this new feeling and why it should prompt such regret, but I suspect that it involves the motherly instinct to save your child. My son had been asleep dying and no one knew, not even his roommate. He was taking a nap before work, nothing that would cause alarm. The morphine patches he had been using took over and he fell asleep. However, as I watched onstage last night, I thought, No one really knows what it’s like to die, and did his thoughts cry out to me?

Chapter 31, PART 2

Also, it makes me wonder, will there ever be a time in my life when new thoughts and ways to hurt cease? Will hanging Christmas ornaments ever become a pleasant family ritual again instead of a time to endure? Is there an unknown beast behind each door?

These moments occur when we do not expect them. If we expect them, at least we can prepare somewhat mentally. I have no words of advice here, other than these moments will happen and sometimes emotions jump beyond our control. I made it through the last of the musical and kept my tears from others, but this pain surprised me in public and the best I could do was make it through.

Within an hour, I was back to normal again, so I know that the expression of the feelings does not last as long as it did in the beginning, but still, something can trigger the emotion without your knowing it. I cannot cook a Bubba Burger without thinking of my son, but at least now I don’t feel like crying as I did the first time.

Chapter 31, PART 3

I do not mean to discourage anyone, but I want to let you know that these strange bolts from nowhere are to be expected and it doesn’t mean you’ve lost all the progress you have made in your life. I fully imagine ten years from now, some strange deep-rooted memory will hit me and my eyes will well up and I’ll feel the pain again, but I know in the meantime, it’s getting easier. Perhaps that’s why the musical production hit me so squarely in the chest: I’d become used to things being a little easier, but I always remind myself, they will be easier again.

Kathy Kimbro, a poet friend of mine, wrote a poem that she graciously allowed me to use in this book that captures the feeling that catches you off guard, first at the beginning of the grief process, then again, much later on. The poem is titled “Portals” and it reflects that which happens to us.

Chapter 31, part 4

PORTALS

People who have lost

Know grief.

Those who have not lost

Believe grief ceases when the last relative

Departs for the airport

Expressing little inkling that, in their departure,

The one who has lost hesitates, clicks shut the door

Forehead meets palm

Behind the safe barrier of post and lintel.

Then,

Grief wraps ‘round.

An opaque shawl.

You, Mourning-One, pause

Picking up breakfast dishes.

Mind-lessly

You set them down again.

Then, in the bath

Tile-stricken walls echo grief-music

Munsch-ian primal screams.

Years later, on some crisp early morning, you

Elbow open the garage door

Slam shut the car door.

Clinking keys

Turn on ignition, the scream repeats

In the car.

With the engine running

No one can hear.

From whence hails this grief moment

Just when?

When

You funnel lunch into its brown bag,

Remember morning meeting notes,

Stacking bag and memos neatly beside you in,

Oh

The blank verse of the un-rhymed

Deleted line.

Afterwards, you breathe, and handkerchief.

Then

Reverse the car out of its cave into

Daylight’s remnants, to tunnel the rest of your road.

~ Kate Kimbro

Chapter 31, part 5

ACTIVITY

Try to meet with someone else who has lost a child or contact Compassionate Friends. Often, it helps if we know that we are not the only one who suffers.