mom

When the phone rang, I knew.

Although we had left Dad stable and in good spirits in the capable hands of the ICU the night before, Ellie had just woken me by touching my foot to tell me that Mom and Julie were on their way to the hospital.

“Why?” I asked.


"Dad’s heart stopped, they’re resuscitating him."

I knew.

“Shit.” I said.

We floundered through a few minutes of confusion, trying to figure out what to do. Should we go right away? Wake the five sleeping kids and take them with us? Wait to hear something? We decided to get ready. As I was asking Bill if he’d mind staying with the kids so Ellie and I could get down there, the phone rang.

I knew.

It was mom.

She said: “I’m sorry honey, Daddy died.”

She had just been through the unimaginable horror of holding on to the love of her life while he died. Yet when she called to tell us, her first words were “I’m sorry”

It’s mom, you know. It’s mom who breaks my heart. Her broken heart is breaking my heart.

But I didn’t start this to be a(nother) tear jerker, just ignore these rivers running down my cheeks. I meant to write this about my mom, because she is amazing.

A couple of days before she threw me out I left, Mom told me that she wasn’t going to be one of those women who reek of sadness and loss, whose grief is so palpable that everyone avoids her to protect themselves from darkness.

Mom is destroyed inside, but to the world she presents the image of a person who is carrying on.

She greets us with her morning email every day, and her grief is right there between the lines, but her determination to forge ahead into this unchartered territory is giving strength to all of us.

Mom keeps thanking us for the little things we're doing to help, making calls and filling out forms and setting up systems for smooth household operations. The easy stuff, the stuff no one really thought much about because Dad took care of it. It's selfish of us to accept Mom's thanks for these things though, because doing them makes us feel better, like we're not just sitting here wallowing in this thing that has happened to us. To mom.

I want to thank Mom, though, because her strength is helping me bear the impossible weight of this world that insists on carrying on without Dad in it.

Mom has great friends - she is surrounded by smart, funny, warm, wonderful women and men who are looking out for her. At the wake, I lost count of how many people looked me in the eye and told me that they loved my mom.

In her eulogy, Mary Beth said:

In collecting our thoughts for today, we were laughing about the fact that everyone says, "Your father was SUCH a nice guy." Everyone. No one hedges their praise.
.

The same can be said for Mom. Everyone in that long, long line kept talking about what a fan they were of Mom's, and how they'd keep her in their hearts and minds. Just yesterday I received a note that said: "Your mother is one of my very favorite people in the world."

No wonder Dad was so crazy about her.

I love you, Mom. Thanks for pretending that you're okay so the rest of us can pretend that we are, too. We're in this together, this thing you so aptly named: "my new fucking life."