I woke up early this morning and didn’t, to my wonder, dissolve into tears.
That may be a normal occurrence for most people, but since 1996, that’s always been the way the morning of October 10th has begun for me: I open my eyes and snap to instant, heart-pounding awareness of the date and what happened two or five or ten or seventeen years ago. I remember the words “We lost Mom tonight.” I remember thinking that such a thing simply couldn’t be, not with her only fifty-seven years old; not with my children not yet born; not with so many things unsaid. Inevitably, the tears start to flow.
Hoo boy. Yeah, pretty much every October 10th for the better part of nearly two decades, I’ve been one hot mess.
But today—
Today feels different.
When I opened my eyes this morning, I knew what day it was—after almost two decades, how could I not? It’s like my body senses it, tenses up and prepares for the wave of sadness and grief to come. But this morning, for the first time, it didn’t.
Instead, a picture of my mother sprang into my mind, one taken at my wedding. In it, she is smiling a big, beautiful, bright smile that always, always, always makes me smile in return and fills my heart with joy.
Wait, what? Joy? What is this? Where is the heart-crushing grief? Where is the ache in my stomach? Where are the tears spilling silently onto my pillow?
I did a quick assessment, head to toe, heart to soul, growing more and more puzzled, but to my wonder, this morning, for the first time, I failed to find that wellspring of sorrow and loss I’ve carried around for so many years. In its place, I found only a cautious, curious sense of wellbeing.
The thing is, I don’t know where the grief went.
Is it gone? Does Grief just one day decide to disappear, to end? Why didn’t Grief tell me it was leaving? Will Grief be back tomorrow, next month, next year? Did Grief, that sly character, hit the snooze button and is planning to ambush me ninja-style later today, maybe in the middle of a run or in the shower or at the grocery store (there’s precedent)?
Or is it possible that finally I’ve learned, finally I’ve given myself permission to let Grief go?
I wrote about my mom’s death two years ago (“Life After Death”) and some of the lessons I’ve learned since that day. When I read that piece over again now this morning, I can still find the pain buried in those words, but I don’t feel it in my heart. All I’m feeling right now, in fact, at this moment, is a deep sense of peace, of calm, and—when I think of that picture of my mother—joy.
Why now, after so many years? Does Grief have an expiration date? Is it, perhaps, Maturity (I did just turn forty-five last week; maybe there’s an age cut-off)? Or—and I can’t rule this out completely—perhaps Abba had it right with their song “Chiquitita” (one of my mom’s favorites, and, by the way, this version is a fun one to watch), and you actually do get to a point where “you’ll be dancing once again and the pain will end, you will have no time for grieving.” (There’s nothing like 70s pop for philosophizing, is there?)
Maybe it’s all of these things, a little. Maybe, too, it’s that I’ve finally come to realize that it’s time to stop focusing on all that I lost and concentrate instead on all that I was given: laughter, friendship, wanderlust, wonder, literacy, ferocity, integrity, strength, independence, courage, and love, love, love, love, LOVE.
Yeah, I guess maybe it is time.
Mom left behind a collection of books by Kahlil Gibran. I think her favorite may have been The Prophet, due to all of the passages she underlined and made notes on. One of the most heavily underlined passages is this one:
The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain…
When you are joyous look deep into your heart and you shall find it is only that which has given you sorrow that is giving you joy.
When you are sorrowful, look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.
Mom, you were definitely our delight, and I have spent many years weeping for the loss of you, but maybe now, I am ready to look again in my heart, to feel the joy again of having had you for the years we did—and to see the truth of that joy again. That is another gift you gave to me, and so today, perhaps I will find myself dancing instead.