2020 - Christmas has been Hijacked! Along with pretty much everything else

In church this morning the preacher was talking about what an awful year this has been for everyone and how this Christmas is going to be the worst Christmas he personally has ever known and he assumed most people felt the same.  

We are in a second wave and huge surge in the first worldwide pandemic that has been seen since 1918.  At best it has hijacked our peace, our family time, our vacation plans, our holidays, our weddings, our honeymoons, our graduations, and birthday celebrations, our educations and the education of our children and grandchildren.  And at worst it has hijacked our health, our businesses our jobs and the ability to support our families, our sanity, our mental and emotional health and the ultimate -- precious members of our families and then the funerals to honor and pay respects to those precious members, 

We have seen our fair and equitable election process be made a total sham of leaving the country in a horribly divided embarrassing mess and the highest office in our once great land has been made a mockery of. The election process and in turn the presidency of the United States have literally been hijacked.

The president elect apparently has dementia and cannot even complete an intelligent  sentence.  And I'm not making fun.  It is sad that he has been put on display in this kind of condition for people to attack him for something he cannot help.  It is disgusting to see and I feel terribly sorry for him but all sympathy aside he is not fit for the office of President and it is my sincere believe that he will never be allowed to serve that in that capacity and I do not believe that it was ever intended that he would. Human decency, it seems, has been hijacked as well. 

Real Journalism has certainly been hijacked taken over by social media and tech moguls. We are now being spoon-fed political propaganda and everything that does not agree with their agenda - censored. The first amendment to our bill of rights - our Freedom of Speech - has been hijacked.

Truth has certainly been hijacked.  There is no truth not even in the face of a worldwide pandemic - we can't even trust what we are told about the health crisis affecting the entire world because the truth has become relative depending on which political party you hear it from.

We have racial unrest and violence in almost every major city that has been bought and paid for and carefully choreographed. They have killed, maimed and destroyed and it has all been sanctioned by the local Governments. 

Cities have been taken over.  Our Historical Statues and Monuments, pieces of our history, beautiful expressions of art, owned and paid for by the American Tax Payer have been destroyed; again fully sanctioned by the local Governments. 

Police have lost all power and are not allowed to even defend themselves from violent protesters.  Again sanctioned by the local Governments. Law and order and democracy gone.  Yep. Hijacked.

All culminating to be "globally" yes, the worst year I've ever known in my 67 years but "personally" well that's a different story.  2014 still has that prize and so far though this has been no picnic, Christmas 2014 still holds the record at my house.. 

The thing about this Christmas vs. 2014 Christmas is that 2014 kind of ruined every Christmas from now on.  Hoping to God that 2020 will not have that same power and effect.  

The world has looked upside down and wrong to all of us for six years and it just kind of feels like to me like the rest of world has just now caught up.

Christmas Season

We are now six Christmases in and I have yet to celebrate Christmas again.  I have managed a small tree for a few of those years and in 2014 I understood fully why I just couldn't do Christmas but even in the early stages of catastrophic grief I believed Christmas would come back for us in a year or two.  It is surprising even to me that six seasons later I am still not having Christmas.  

I have worried that it was a rebellion of sorts stemming from an unrecognized underlying anger with God but I really did not "feel" angry anymore and don't feel that I would ever do that so I really couldn't understand why I was actually, intentionally balking at having any kind of Christmas celebration.  Last year I actually felt like Christmas could possibly "come back".  I was a little enthusiastic about decorating and even purchased a new smaller tree but then December 3, my sister went to the hospital with pneumonia.  When she got to the ER by ambulance her fever was over 105 and she went into a coma and ended up in ICU on life support for 15 days.  Waking up by nothing less that a pure miracle on Christmas Eve --the entire month of December missing from her life.  It took six months of therapy to get her mobile and back to maybe 75%.  She will never really fully overcome that huge setback.  

So this year I was fully expecting to have Christmas on track full steam again.  Not.

I have less enthusiasm than I had last year.  It seems Christmas returning is farther away than it was four years ago.  And I have been totally baffled as to why.  This morning I read a devotional that I get by email daily.  It was about Christmas.  It really ended up being nothing about anything remotely familiar to my life and yet the beginning of it hit me like a brick -- an epiphany of sorts and suddenly I realized what my deal with Christmas is actually about.  It is not, as I had worried, a rebellion towards God or what Christmas stands for at all.  It is about what Christmas had become for me.

As a child I was such a dreamer.  I was beside myself over Christmas every year.  The promise that it held of the latest and greatest new toy being advertised on TV, a family outing to pick out a tree, everyone gathering to decorate it, the lights, the beautiful packages with ribbons and bows.  And of course every year I prayed for snow.  I live in Atlanta, Georgia - never in my life did I see a white Christmas but it didn't stop me from praying for it in rapt anticipation year after year.  I stared out the window into the darkness late into the night Christmas Eve looking for Santa's sleigh.  I imagined of my mother putting out cookies and milk for Santa and the family gathering around and singing Christmas Carols as we hung stocking on our fireplace.  I was a hopeless dreamer.

I was the oldest of four children born to two alcoholic parents Christmas for us was about as far from my Norman Rockwell dream as it could get.  

My mother always saw to it that we always had a tree and toys.  And I should have been more thankful for what we did have I guess.  But it wasn't toys I longed for.  It wasn't greed that fueled my disappointment.  I wanted "family".  I wanted normal.  I wanted the things money could not buy.  I wanted my mother home for Christmas.  I wanted us all gathered around the table for a festive Christmas dinner together.  I wanted us to spend time together baking cookies, wrapping gifts, singing carols.  But she never was.  She was gone.  Almost every Christmas eve as long as I could remember - sometimes she worked, sometimes she was just gone all Christmas Eve.  We never saw her till Christmas Day - grouchy, half asleep and hungover.  

We were left with Daddy and Daddy was crazy-mean when he was drunk.  Our Christmas Eve was spent wondering what lay in store for us before morning.  Were we going to be beaten or were one of our pets going to be abused or killed.  And Christmas for some reason brought out the absolute worst in him.  Ghosts from his raising I'm sure.  So we had memorable Christmases but not the kind Norman Rockwell would paint about.  

One memorable Christmas Eve, while Mama was working of course, he gathered all of four of us into the car (usually in pajamas, barefooted and without coats) and informed us we were going for a ride.  It was his thing to get drunk and want to drive around - a particularly terrifying event for all of us.  He drove around for about a half hour and then pulled down a dead end street and parked the car.  He turned off all the lights, opened the door and got out which was also very typical of these late night rides.  And he disappeared into the darkness leaving all four of us in the cold, dark car wondering what was coming next.  When he returned we heard him open the trunk of the car, fumble around, cuss and then he pulled open the drivers door and got in.  He was carrying the 38 caliber pearl-handled pistol that he had dubbed "Old Smoky" that always seemed to appear when he had a few drinks.  For a little added drama, he had a glove he also had taken from the trunk of the car and tossed it into the back seat to my sister closest to me in age and demanded she check it out and tell him what she found.  

She answered, "bullets Daddy."  

"How many?" he demanded.  

"Five" she said.  

"Yes, he agreed.  Five; one for each of you and one for your mother."  

We all started to cry and ask why?  What had we done?  

No answer.  He got out of the car again and disappeared into the dark as all of us sat there frozen waiting for the shooting to begin.

Then he later comes back to the car and without another word cranks the car and heads for home.

Another Christmas Eve while yet again Mama was "gone".  He put us to bed early and then around 1:00 am came and woke us all up and had us open all of our dresser drawers and empty the contents onto the floor.  Where then he instructed us to take them to the kitchen and place them into the washer to wash the clean clothes.  When they were washed, dried and folded he dumped them into the floor and said, "Now do it again till you get it right."  So we washed clothes, clean clothes, all night until daybreak Christmas morning.

There were Christmases where we had to leave home and interrupt some relatives Christmas begging them to let us stay with them because he was in a drunken rage and we had no where to go.  There were Christmases where the police came and hauled him away in handcuffs with all of the neighborhood kids watching.  

Yes, our Christmases were always memorable albeit in a "Stephen King" sort of way.  

And yet, every single year like an idiot, without fail I had hope anew that "this year" we'd suddenly wake up in a normal home and Christmas would be wonderful.  

When I left home at 14 we had still not turned into the Cleavers.  

But I determined that when I had a family of my own and it was entirely up to me - my kids would have the perfect Christmas of my dreams. Perfect of course does not exist but I tried.  God knows, I tried.

We had no money so I started Christmas shopping in July buying one or two things at a time.  I hid gifts, I wrapped gifts.  I made handmade bows.  I planned family outings to a tree farm where we went up and down rows and rows of ridiculously priced trees to find the perfect one.  I slowly over the years collected little old fashioned wooden ornaments and carefully wrapped and packed them every year like they were fine crystal and when I pulled the out the next year it was almost a "holy event" as we carefully lifted the little wooden toy ornaments along with whatever hand made ornaments my children had made that year in school.  I'd fix snacks and we'd have a little mini-party as we put on Christmas music and all decorated the tree as a family.  It was several years before we had a house with a real fireplace but once we did, I'd string live pine garland with mini-lights the length of the mantle with big red bows and all of the kids stockings.  We'd pile packages under the tree and make games out of trying to keep my middle child from peeping into his gifts before Christmas.  In later years I baked Christmas cookies and made homemade fruitcakes and divinity, the menu and the guest list grew as our little Christmas Eve party gained momentum.  

My children got married and grand kids came along and we added stockings to the mantle and our Christmases got large and loud and messy and wonderful.  We began inviting anyone that had no place to go on Christmas.  We bought extra gifts and always had tons of food.  Soon my children numbered 17 and Christmas had grown to about 30 to 40.  Then life and divorces happened. Schedules became complicated when my boys both had to fight for a few hours with their children on Christmas Eve.  Geography and time constraints and the whims of ex-wives made our Christmases begin to be stressful and difficult and everyone began to seem on edge.  The last Christmas we all had as a family 2013 working a full time job and driving 3 and a half hours a day in Atlanta traffic meant I had to work on getting Christmas together for weeks a little at a time.  I planned.  I decorated.  I cooked.  I wrapped.  And Christmas came and everyone seemed to just be in a hurry to leave.  They ate.  Unwrapped gifts and all began to get up and get ready to leave.  My son came from four hundred miles away to stay one hour and the two local children and all of their children said they had to go because they were all getting together and going to see a movie.  It was their "Christmas Tradition" now to all go see a movie on Christmas Day.  So they all left and I sat alone in the middle of all of my weeks of Christmas Crap and cried the rest of the afternoon and vowed I would never do "all this" again. 

And I never have.  That was the last Christmas I was to ever have my entire family and it was also the Christmas that I realized that Christmas as we had always known it --was over.  Truly over.  

It was not something any of them wanted --a big traditional family Christmas  --was my dream because it was something I had never had as a child.  It was never theirs.  They had always had it so to them it was no more than an aggravating annual obligation that they could not wait to get away from.  

Kids grow up.  Grand kids grow up.  Life changes.  Traditions change.  It was heartbreaking and on top of everything else I had to grieve, I also grieved the loss of our family Christmas.  And so I haven't had Christmas since 2013.  

And I realized this morning that opting out of Christmas was never a rebellion.  It was just the end of an era.  One that's time had passed.  Family get-togethers, I had assumed, much like fruitcake and homemade bread, are a thing of the past.  They still have family traditions like going to a movie on Christmas Day and even family get-togethers at Christmas.  I'm just no longer a part of their family now...

August

Birthdays, I think, are the hardest.  Yesterday would have been Kara's 33rd.  At least half of this month of August has been so difficult and I feel like I have really taken a major leap backwards and birthdays have played a large part in that.


The 16th - the date that I gave Kara her early birthday present because I had been unable to come home much with my sister sick and was afraid I would miss her birthday.  I never-ever give anyone their birthday or Christmas presents early.  Guess we now know why I was lead to make an exception this year.


The 18th - the date of the last video that Kara's made of Paxton and sent to me.  She also sent one to her mom.  Mine was of Paxton saying:  "Hey Nana, I love you."  Nancy's said: "Hey Me-ma, I love you."


The 22nd - Kara's mom's birthday and the last time she ever heard her daughter's voice and just hours before their deaths.  Her birthday will never be a happy occasion of celebration again.


The 23rd - the actual day they died but forever noted incorrectly because they were not found until the 24th. 


The 24th - the day that changed all of our lives forever.  The worst day in all of our lives up to that day.  The day that changed what we would have as a future but it also because of what the police said happened even made us question our past.  If that was true then nothing else we had ever known was true.  That day made us all question everything we knew, everything we believed in and everything we could ever hope for.


The 25th - Brian's oldest son's birthday.  It was his twenty third and it was the one that would change every birthday from now on because "this" would dominate.  "This" would mar.  "This" would be all he would ever think about for every birthday now forever.


The 31st - Kara's birthday.  It would have been her 30th.  A birthday she was looking forward to and dreading but would never see.  And now forever for her family they can never think of her birthday that the anniversary of her death does not loom over it.


I pray for peace for all of us as August is once again in the rear-view mirror thank goodness.

Christmas...yet again.

As hard as it is to believe here we are back in December and chose again not to celebrate Christmas  and again this year two days from Christmas Day --sitting at a funeral.  Last year it was two days before Christmas - funeral. My aunt passed away.  This year - two days after Christmas - funeral.  Another aunt passed away.  Last year right after my aunt passed away my youngest sister lost her brother in law unexpectedly.  This year right before my aunt passed away my other sister lost a sister in law unexpectedly.  Both were in their mid 50's.  Last year we had Christmas dinner in the Waffle House and I thought that was bad.  This year we were in the middle of nowhere in South Georgia and there wasn't even a Waffle House.  We ate day-old fried chicken from a gas station! 


Seriously, this has got to stop.  That is about more weird than I can handle.


Tomorrow is New Year's eve.  And keeping with tradition, we are heading to my best friend's house to spend the night.  Again, glad to see the year come to a close but not nearly as glad as last year and I'm not sure why because it did not change a thing. 


Christmas came and went.  We ran away from home as usual.  We went down to South Georgia to see Brian's oldest son.  I didn't want him to be alone on Christmas and it brought me closer to his dad to be with him.  Then we left there and went straight to where the funeral would be held.  Maybe this is God's way of getting me to gather with family for Christmas?  Last year it was my mother's family.  This year it was my father's.  Scares me a little wondering what's coming next Christmas.


On a different subject - I've been thinking about something lately.  Since I remember very little about Brian's Memorial Service and everything about not being at Kara and Paxton's service seemed so wrong.  The three of them separated and even in separate states just seemed so terrible to me.  I've been considering having another private Memorial Service for the three of them - maybe on the second anniversary. 


I want both families to come together and have a service for them as a family.  It is asking and expecting a lot I know and it may not be received very well but I'm just considering it - for closure - for comfort - for having them and us together - for letting go?  It's still in the thinking stages.  And it may not work out any better than the birthday dinner we planned last year for Brian's birthday - who knows?  But that is just a thought that has been steeping lately. 


December was a rough month as bad as I hate to admit it - we kind of went backward a bit.  It was an entire setback month.  Today I talked to my cousin that I'm very close to.  She lost her youngest daughter at four years old. That was in 1977.  We've almost never spoken of it because it very nearly destroyed her.  But today we did.  And I asked her "How long? How long before you actually wanted to live again?"  I know everyone is different and I know everyone grieves at a different pace but no one will even give me an idea of what to expect and I really, really need to know.  "Three years."  She said, "Maybe three years or maybe a little longer."  That gave me a measure of hope ---for about two minutes right before she added: "But I'm better now."  Now!  Now? Dear God.  Did you get that part about it being thirty nine years ago? 


We are in serious trouble.

Home is where the heart is...or at least where it used to be.

We are coming up on Paxton’s fourth birthday and with Christmas but two weeks later I have decided to get an early start on the crying.  I’ve done a little better lately but am having a rough time getting through December.   I had hoped that after the first year of holidays that Christmas could return.  And maybe it will some time but clearly this is not the year.  This year, we are just going to let it slide again.  I don’t “think” I am being rebellious about it.  I hope I’m not.  But I am just not up to it.  Especially since the last Christmas we had together, was the one where Paxton cried out “Nana, I missed you!” when he saw me and brought both me and his Mama to a puddle of tears.  He had just turned two and I had hardly heard him say a single word you could understand and suddenly he throws out an entire sentence.  That is all I have been able to think about for a week.  So when and if Christmas comes back – it is going to have to look a whole lot different.

Thanksgiving however, was actually good --better than I could have hoped.  We had fourteen which is way above our normal Thanksgiving crowd.  I had a long-time friend and her daughter come that I had not seen in twelve years.  That was a pleasant surprise and she and I had a really nice catch up visit for the entire weekend.   

Brian’s only daughter and first grandchild came – a bitter sweet time for both of us.  This was the first time she had been back to our house since the Memorial Service the week after they all died.  It was difficult for her I know but I am hoping that now that that hurdle has been scaled, it will get easier for her and we will begin to see more of her and the baby.   All in all, it was an enjoyable family gathering.

Speaking of family gatherings, this house has always been the family gathering spot.  We have a lot of space and it has been great for entertaining.  Problem is that is what all of us see here now.  Every family thing we have ever had included Brian and for many years – just Brian.  We have had Sunday Dinners, cookouts and egg hunts, fishing and canoeing, swimming and hiking.  We have held every Christmas, Easter, Thanksgiving, Memorial Day,  July 4 and Labor Day celebration that was held --here. All of the grandchildren learned to swim here, caught their first fish here, climbed their first tree here.   This is where three little boys and me camped out in the back yard - for about two hours before they said, “Nana, camping was FUN!!  Now let’s go inside.” 

There are so many memories here both good and bad.  We’ve been snowed in together without power for a week here during the only blizzard I have ever experienced in over 60 years.  This is where Brian’s oldest son got snake bit on my birthday the year he was two.  The boys worked side by side with Donald and I as we built our very rustic barn from a hundred year old oak tree that fell on the property.  And the boys and Donald spent weeks building an apartment for my mother in the bonus room over a detached garage and that was where she moved into and spent the last four years of her life. 

We have taken 20 plus years of family milestone photographs here including prom pictures, graduation pictures, first car pictures, first fish pictures, wedding pictures and baby pictures. 

This has been the home that has always drawn a crowd and over the years we have hosted well over seven thousand people here for various functions.  Think about that just a minute....

For the last three years of my mother’s life I hosted a party for all of her retiree friends that she worked with for over thirty years.  I have had cookouts and picnics for forty plus friends and co-workers at the last three places I worked at.   We have held over 100 weddings here and at least half-dozen baptisms and of course every single family holiday was here.

For the past twenty three years this is where we have called home and it has truly been the first place that I ever really felt “at home” safe and like I belonged.  The roots we planted ran deep.  Since living here we have loved and then buried twenty years of family pets and here we have experienced every stage of our family’s life – watching as our family has grown exponentially from a family of five to a family of twenty one. 

But this is also where we were when the world came crashing down on us.  This is where I collapsed in a puddle in my bedroom floor surrounded by a steady flow of tears and prayers as together both immediate family and church family learned the details about the loss of my son, my daughter in law and the baby I adored.  

This is where I became intimately familiar with the fuzz in the dark corners of my closet floor as I reeled in shock and tried to absorb all that had happened.  This is where hundreds of friends and family flowed in and out for the following week bringing food, words of comfort, prayers, cards, and support however we needed it.  This is also where I was stared at everywhere we went for the months that followed.  This is where we felt deserted and disillusioned as most of the same friends that had been here that first week seemed to drop off the radar and have never set foot here again.  This is where total strangers and casual business acquaintance asked questions and pressed for details prying open the gaping gashes torn in my heart.  This is where the guy that was so enthusiastic about getting to cut our grass and do some landscaping for us asked around and found out we were “those people” and suddenly refused to show up or take my calls anymore.  This is where for fifteen months my granddaughter and my oldest son have refused to come back to because of the sad reminders that will always connect them to the worst day of their lives leaving me feeling lost and abandoned and not knowing what to do because though that is true for all of us --this was my home.

It once seemed like home to our entire family. 

It's sad that it doesn't feel like home here anymore.  

So Wasted...

Well it has been a while since I have posted.  Sorry. 

We, meaning of course, my husband, my daughter, my son-in-law and my brother – not me - spent four weekends moving the last things out of Brian and Kara’s house.  Kara’s sister retrieved Kara’s things for her family months ago and then the kids took all of the furniture and anything else that they wanted.  So what was left was really only stray stuff – books, exercise equipment, camping gear and the kind of stuff that you have no idea what to do with.  But I did not want to chance anything personal being missed like pictures or letters or anything so it has all been brought back to my home for me to go through and then dispose of.

Then right in the middle of that our lease was up and we had to move out of the rental house.  So we have been in moving hell for more than a month and are living in a disaster area and you seriously could not kick your way through any room in my house for two solid weeks. 

Tuesday was the foreclosure sale of their home - a difficult day to say the least.  That has brought on a lot of renewed anger.  I guess just the pitiful waste of it all.  Wasted efforts of us trying to help them and of course the haunting question – did their being in that house in any way contribute to this? Had we not done that – would we be where we are now?  I realize that in the logical, reasonable world that does not really make any sense – but it haunts me with guilt and fear just the same. 

Then there is the wasted time and effort and the long days and nights that they spent working on the house and what a beautiful job they did and how much love they put into it.  Someone else now will reap the benefits of all that love and hard work without ever knowing how much the home had meant to the family we lost in there.

Then there is the waste of all of their dreams including the dream of Kara having her first child and that house was the only home he ever knew.  He chased Minnie up and down the halls while she barked and he laughed and squealed; he pushed his little “learn to walk” toy that his aunt Michelle had given him up and down the hall a million miles.  That home is where he “Skyped” with his Mema and Pap-Pap that lived out of state, several times a week.  That was where he played in the bathtub --with cars and not boats and that was where I videoed him playing in the tub the last time I babysat with him and laughed while he tried to teach a Lamborghini to swim.  That is where he stood on the sofa and looked out the window every afternoon waiting for his daddy to come home and where I always looked for his little face in that same window as he waved goodbye to me whenever I left.   He jumped on his trampoline in his back yard there and slid on his slide and played with his little special friend next door on the swing set his Mema and Pap-Pap bought for him.  And that was where with tiny hammer in hand, he helped his daddy build the “enormous” woodshed out back.  And where he and his Mama picked the vegetables they had planted together every afternoon from the raised bed garden boxes his daddy built for them.  That is where he used to, in a fit of giggles, shut me in the tiny linen closet I would barely fit in - for a quick game of hide and seek and also where he and I raced  tiny cars around the coffee table hundreds of times.  It was there that I took the last video I have of him singing “Haddy Dirtday” to me just weeks before --he also died in that house.

That was where Kara hosted her first and last Thanksgiving dinner and where she snuggled the newborn baby that she never thought she would have.  That is where she worked and painted and worried over making his nursery just perfect and where she then graduated him from the muted pastels of a “baby nursery” to the toddler “Veggie Tales” theme of bright primary colors and her hand-made people-sized cucumber wall-hanging and then later to the Disney movie “Cars” theme as he developed an obsession to anything with wheels on it.  That is where she hosted a graduation party for my daughter’s son when he graduated high school and where she had her first cookout on the deck and we all gathered for fireworks for the fourth of July.  There was where, with all the patience in the world, she helped Brian’s daughter do her freshly painted conservative neutral beige room in leopard prints and hot pink splatter paint.  And that was where we surprised her with the designer purse that she’d had her eye on for months for the very last birthday she would ever celebrate exactly one year to the day before the day that rocked our world.

Even after all the hard work and talent that Brian put in there, the thing he was most proud of about that house was the fact that it would be paid for in seven years.  He never took that for granted and he was always so grateful to us for helping them out like that.  He could hardly believe that he would be able to provide that kind of security for his family and he thanked us for it repeatedly.

He worked tirelessly on that house from the time he moved in until the week before they died.  In the three months prior he had just put in a new front door, built the woodshed in the back and had the new vanity and tile to begin the remodel on the bathroom – the last of the upstairs to be redone. 

It was the first time he had felt at home since he sold the first home he bought with his first wife 18 years earlier.  And that was where he finally felt like his life was coming back together.  He had started his own business there and much to my dismay had not decided to pursue something that allowed him to use his God-given gifts in wood-working.  He has built some of the most beautiful furniture - bookcases, shelves, chess tables, bathroom vanities, gun cases and even a reproduction of a Victorian “lady’s writing desk” for me.  And of course, he was also so talented at home improvement and carpentry as well and I keep thinking back to when he and I had talked about a joint partnership buying and redoing foreclosed homes since he had outdone himself on the remodel of this house.  Little did I know that the first foreclosure sale I would attend would be the sale of this home under “these” horrific circumstances.  So yeah, there was a lot of emotion surrounding the house sale and a lot of anger at the magnitude of the waste.

But on the other hand, it has caused me so much anguish worrying over what to do about it until now that it is done – I just can’t think about it anymore.  

We are getting really good at pretending...

We pretended Thanksgiving was not on Thursday this year and held a “family get-together” on Saturday instead that was definitely not Thanksgiving.  

Then we pretended for some reason -- perhaps a new law went into effect - one that I don't remember ever voting for, like day-light savings time or mandatory insurance -- that required that Christmas be canceled this year.  Maybe it will be on schedule for next year who knows? Congress is still out on that right now.  But for 2014 Christmas was eliminated from the calendar.

I also pretended Paxton was just out of town for his third birthday.  Maybe off to Florida enjoying Disney or Legoland and that is why we did not buy the gifts we'd wanted to give him or have cake and watch him blow out candles or gather around him and sing “Haddy Dirtday” to him. 

Then I had the brilliant idea to actually let Brian’s birthday take place this year.  I decided we would remember him by baking his favorite cake then we would all get together and go out for pizza.  We'd reminisce about him tell funny "Brian stories" laugh and celebrate his life.

That did not work out quite like I’d planned.  

I cried for three solid weeks afterward.

Turns out pretending was working way better for me so I opted to go back to pretending.   And so Easter this year was just another Sunday.  For the first time in twenty years we did not attend Sunrise Service or the fellowship breakfast afterward.  I did not go and help out with the Easter-Egg hunt on Saturday (although I did stuff 180 plastic eggs so as not to be a complete slacker.)  I did not buy a new springy pastel Easter dress but instead rummaged through my closet and dragged out a regular black and tan dress. I raked a comb through my hair, dabbed on some mascara and managed to show up for Sunday-School.  I didn’t even hear the sermon preached during the regular service but chose to keep the nursery instead.  I saw none of my children or grandchildren nor did I, in fact, see any family at all other than my husband that lives there.  The two of us ate lunch out and came back to the rental house early and watched TV till time to go to bed.

I’m going to Memphis to Graceland for Mother’s Day.  I'm pretending to be on vacation...

My all time favorite

Brian always kept the entire family entertained.  He just always had such an unusual way of looking at things and always just said the first thing that came into his head.

My sister came and had lunch with me today for support as she knew yesterday was going to be hard on me.  Today I was able to talk about Brian.  We sat outside in the little garden picnic area provided by our building and as I looked down at the beautiful blooming Hyacinths I remembered one mother’s day when he was about 13, Brian asked me what kind of flowers I liked.  (His dad had put him up to asking.)  I am not a long-stemmed roses kind of person and told him I would like something that I could plant in the yard.  I said, "How about hyacinths - I love hyacinths."  He later told me about going into the garden shop with his dad to get them and he told the lady he couldn’t remember what they were but they were pink and sounded like Hippopotamus! 

Miraculously, she sent them home with a pretty pink Hyacinth tied up with a bow. 

She laughed and then she reminded me of her all-time favorite “Brian story”.  Which I agreed was also mine.  And I decided to share it here.

During the 1980’s I used to be a lot more organized than I am today.  Had I not been with three kids, cats, dogs, rabbits, a full time job and attending college classes in the evenings – I would have misplaced a child or two on a daily basis.  One thing I credited with helping me keep down the clutter was that the American Kidney Foundation sent trucks around regularly to pick up household items and clothing donations.  I was diligent about clearing out the clothes and shoes that the kids had outgrown or older toys that they no longer played with.  We just did not have the additional drawer/closet space to spare.  So consequently, I was on their list of “regulars” and they frequently placed a courtesy call to me the week they would be in my area.  I was in the middle of preparing country-fried steak for dinner when one such call came in.

Brian was home from track practice and was in the kitchen with me chattering away about his day when the phone rang.  I turned to him with both hands full of flour and said: “Grab that would ya and see who it is – tell them I’ll call them back in just a few minutes.”

And this was what I heard on his end. 

“Hello, no, she’s busy right now.  Can I ask who is calling and have her call you back?” 

Suddenly, his face turns ashen and he has the most confused and …disgusted look on his face and then he literally yells into the phone:  

“DO WHAT?  Like WHAT?  Spare body parts?”

And with that he shoves the phone at me and literally runs from the room sick to his stomach.  Totally baffled, I take the phone --dusting everything in White Lily Flour --and say: “Hello?”

On the other end the lady is literally rolling in the floor and she says through fits of laughter:

“Yes mam, I’m with the Kidney Foundation and we are going to have our truck in your area this week and were wondering if you had any donations you wanted us to pick up?”

Brian's 42nd birthday

Well, I expected it to be hard and it certainly did not disappoint.  I decided I might not have enough time to get it all in --so I started crying yesterday.  And kept it up periodically all day today as well.  It was harder than Christmas, Thanksgiving and even Paxton's birthday although that was really tough too. 


I baked his favorite German Chocolate cake because the lady leading the meetings at GriefShare suggested we actually acknowledge or even celebrate his birthday.  It would make us feel closer and like he had not been forgotten.  So I had planned to have lunch with my daughter and son in law, talk about Brian and tell some funny stories about him or share our favorite memories, have his favorite cake and feel like we had honored his memory and acknowledged that he was still a part of our family and always would be.  I baked the cake...


I cried all through the cake baking wishing I had baked it last year but knowing I did not.  We went to lunch - I cried all the way there and all the way back and couldn't talk about him at all because I knew I would make a scene in the restaurant.  Then they showed me his daughter's post on Facebook and that made me cry. 


She posted a sweet note to him that sadly I knew was something that he had waited his entire life to hear. She told him how she wished he could see that baby and that she now finally realized how much he had loved the three of them.  She said she finally understood how deep a parent's love really was.  She said she loved him and she wished that she had told him.  He, like most parents, would have given all he had to hear her acknowledge that.


I had wanted to write something special for him today much like she did but for some reason - I can't.  All I can do is cry. 


Here we are almost seven months later.  We still have no idea what actually happened.  And though I have honestly "tried" to buy the story we have --I still can't.  You just had to know him like we all knew him.  He had a quick temper that is true but he has never been able to hurt anything in his entire life.  He had a temper but he could never hold a grudge.  He blew it off and was completely over it and remorseful in 10 minutes.  He was just loud.  But truly good-hearted.  He loved deeply and was loyal to a fault. 


It was his birthday six years ago and he had run back into Kara that week after six years had passed since they had first met - "Mom, I know you are going to think I am crazy but I let her get away one time, and I do not intend to do that again."


They had met when he was thirty years old and she was just 18 and right out of school.  He went out with her a few times and even brought her to church once then he abruptly broke it off.  He said she was just too young.  Even though he did not look but about nineteen himself - he had lived a lot more of life than she had and he was afraid.  He was afraid she would regret not living some of her life before she settled down.  He was afraid she would do like his first wife and wait until she was 25 and then decide she wanted to live all the life she had missed.  He had reservations about what his kids would think; what other people would think; what her parents would think; how she would relate to his kids considering her age. He could not handle it and so he broke it off and apparently always regretted it. 


He said he had looked for her everywhere he went.  He only dated two girls in between and he could never commit.  He said he had not been consciously waiting on her but he did admit he could never completely get her out of his mind.  When they ran into each other after six years he asked her to marry him two weeks later!  She was grown now and he no longer had the same worries and reservations about her and he was determined never to lose her again. That was the week of his 36th birthday.  They married the following July.  He felt like all that had been taken from him when his first wife left was being restored to him.  And he was happier than I had ever seen him.  He had never thought he could ever trust again and used to always say he would never marry again.  But not only did he know immediately that he wanted to marry Kara - trust was never an issue. 


She loved him and she made sure he knew it.  He never doubted her love for him even after all he'd been through. She admired him for his talents.  She trusted his judgment in everything and she always liked the fact that he was the head of the family and took care of the finances.  Unlike most girls her age - independence was something she cared very little about.  His taking care of those things was actually a measure of security to her and I believe with all my heart that she loved her life with him.  He also admired her.  He admired who she was as a person - her honesty and dedication to their marriage and their home.  He trusted her completely and always knew she was a good-hearted person.  He admired her as a mother and in five years of marriage he never once complained about anything to do with her.  He never to my knowledge ever said an unkind word about her to anyone.  He always bragged on her cooking and what a good housekeeper she was and thought she was absolutely the best mom ever to their son.  He would have given her anything she wanted that was in his power to provide.


There is just still no way that I can know who he was in his heart and believe he was in any way capable of this.  I know I'm his mother but it isn't just me - no one that ever knew him can believe it.  There was nothing he would not do for anyone. 


He was my heart and I don't know how I will ever live without him but still to me the hardest part of this is the legacy this leaves for him that I will never believe he deserves.


Brian, I love you with all my heart and I miss you more than I even thought possible and no matter what - I knew who you were and nothing will ever make me believe this. 


Forty -two years ago I became Brian's mom - and nothing will ever change that.

2014 is finally gone!

But before it left...


We actually did go to my best friend's house for our traditional New Year's celebration.  We stayed in and had a nice visit and a great dinner. However, the holiday was overshadowed when upon arriving I found out that she had received a phone call from her doctor that day and her mammogram and subsequent sonogram came back showing several cysts and one tumor.  She has been referred to a surgeon for a biopsy/lumpectomy and has a breast cancer scare looming over her head.


My little granddaughter ended up in the hospital from dehydration.


My grandson brought home a stray kitten that he found on his job.  The poor little thing was about starved to death and appeared to be a little sickly.  My daughter thought rescuing a little kitten might give her something to feel good about so she agreed to the addition to her household. 


She took the kitten to the vet thinking a checkup, a little food and some vitamins would quickly get him on his way back to good health. A hundred and thirty dollars later she finds out that the kitten has "cat herpes" that has blinded him in one eye and also showing signs of it being in the other eye. She was told it was non-curable, would flare up periodically, and cause him to be sick the rest of his life. It was also highly contagious to any other cat, pose a danger of infection to anyone that had sensitive eyes (which she does) and could be dangerous to anyone with a compromised immune system. 


She had now exposed herself to eye infection, exposed her family cat to an incurable disease and also exposed every cat in her neighborhood.  So she had to turn right around after thinking about it and pay seventy dollars more to have it put to sleep and disposed of!  And the rescued little kitten that she was hoping would make her feel better after losing her brother, sister in law and nephew - lost his life to the tune of two hundred dollars at Christmas!


Unbelievable.


It's going to get better.  I know it is.

Christmas – ugh.

As suggested, we chose to change our Christmas tradition this year…we chose not to celebrate at all. 

First time in my entire life although there have been many times I have wanted to just let it slide – I never had the guts.  Fear of disappointing others has kept me from it.  This year everyone was kind of disappointed already so we just let it go. 

No tree.  No decorations.  No children.  No grandchildren.  No extended family.  No Christmas dinner.  No Christmas --period.

I just could not put up a Christmas tree and pull out all of the little handmade Christmas ornaments that the three kids have made over the years reminding me that there are now only two.  I could not pull out of the little wooden toy ornaments that I have been decorating our trees with for most of their lives.  I could not unpack the kids Christmas stockings with Brian’s baby nickname on it –B-B. (The name he called himself when he was little trying to say “Baby”)  The little handprints that Kara made for us with Paxton’s tiny baby hand or his stocking that said Baby’s First Christmas.  The red satin balls that we laugh about every time we pull them out because we are always reminded of the year Brian was five and he was helping decorate the tree and all we had were those red satin balls and he walked around and around the tree and finally in exasperation put it back in the box exclaiming loudly “I can’t find any place for this one!” and picked up another one identical to it and put it immediately on the branch right in front of him.  He was such a goof.

So instead Donald and I sat alone in the house.  Ate a crappy lunch at the Waffle House and came home to a marathon of nauseatingly syrupy Shirley Temple movies.

And 2014 could not just go quietly without hitting us yet again.  On Friday December 19^th, my mother’s oldest sister and the aunt that I was always closest to --passed away at 92 years old. So on the 23^rd of December - four months to the day after the kids died I’m sitting at a funeral.  Saturday December 20^th, my sister’s 56-year old brother in law died unexpectedly – The actual cause of death is yet unknown.  Perfectly healthy 56 year old man woke up with unexplained stomach pain leading to the discovery of systemic sepsis from what they suspect was a perforated bowel and within 48 hours he was gone.

We have had a standing tradition to go and spend New Year’s Eve with my best friend Kathie and her husband.  We would eat dinner out and come back to her house to quietly ring in the New Year and go to bed and then we’d get up New Year’s Day and I would make homemade blueberry waffles for everyone for breakfast and then together we would cook a Traditional Southern New Year’s dinner. 

Her husband usually cooks pork tenderloin on the grill and she and I together do the rest. We enjoy a great dinner together clean up, pack up and head home.  This year, I had originally canceled our visit since I have not really been able to do social things. And I did not want to spoil anyone else’s holiday but she kept saying although she understood if I didn’t – if I felt like I could --even last minute – come on.  I do look forward to that all year long and though I did not want to promise since I didn’t know if I actually “could” I thought maybe if I knew she wasn’t going to a lot of trouble and expense planning it – I could leave it at “maybe” status.   

New Year’s was one holiday I actually wanted to celebrate and asked her if I could muster up what it took to come could we just make the two hour drive to the mountains and have New Year’s dinner at The Dillard House Restaurant.  She was on board and so that was the new plan…now after two more deaths in my family and still yet another week left in this stinking year – I’m terrified to leave home!

I did not really miss having Christmas but have had my usual relapse of the crying spells from being home.  Like I told Donald, it is not so much wondering how I will make it through Christmas but how we will make it through the rest of our lives…

I feel like I am sinking into a dark hole. Not a feeling I was expecting four months later.  I was expecting to have several really hard months each getting easier than the one before and then once I got past those and the first holidays and birthdays etc. I would be safely beyond the danger of depression.  That doesn’t appear to be the case.  Everyone seems to have moved on and begun to get on with their lives again as if nothing has happened and I am back to crying in the toy department.  Not only the toy department but baby clothes, children’s shoes, tools – even the word “tools” as it refers to computer tools on my job, I can’t even channel surf past carpentry or home improvement shows on TV or go by garlic bread sticks, eggnog or pumpkin pie in the grocery store.

I was in Walmart to pick up a few things including food for a pot of soup yesterday and could not see through the tears to get my shopping done.  I was crying down every single aisle; thinking to myself: “I cannot buy him those little shoes.  I can never again buy him these little cartoon pajamas.  I cannot buy him these cars or those trucks.  I cannot get him this new movie.  I can never read him this book or see him in that little hat.  I cannot buy him this cuddly teddy bear to sleep with…”

 I feel like I am losing my mind and I’m quite sure to the occasional shopper I look like it too.