Wade in the Water

Today is the 20th anniversary of my mother's death. I will be 31 in 8 days.

Every year, when this day comes, it always surprises me how hard it is. Sometimes I know the day is coming, and I approach it with dread. Sometimes I will forget, and the day will sneak up on me. I felt the grief coming on like a cold this year. Suddenly one day you wake up sick and realize you've had symptoms for days.

I am lucky enough to have friends in my life that understand grief, even if it's not my version of it. Today Angie came to pick me up and we did Saturday afternoon things. Tonight I went to Dana's and had pizza with her, and then we spent at least an hour amusing ourselves with a spanish phrase book. An example, you ask? Here you are:

Donde esta el bano?
Where is the bathroom?
Haaay, where's y'alls el ban-yo?
I need to poop-o in yer el-bain-o!
How do y'all say "doodle" in Mexican?

So you see, the day was not without laughter, or friends.

Still, when I left her house I felt it settle back into my bones. I drove towards home, knowing it was entirely too late to go to the cemetary. I drove there anyway, and on the radio they were playing "Hey Jude". I remember thinking that song was about her when I was a little girl, even though they'd forgotten the "y".

I drove past the cemetary, and I'm sure I looked oh-so-creepy stalking it. It reminded me of the time, when I was about 9, that she left me in the car at a graveyard to put flowers on a grave, then snuck back to the car and scared the shit out of me. (donde esta el bano!!!)

Drove myself home after that, but couldn't bear to turn into the driveway just yet. I drove past my house and instead headed to the house I grew up in, where my sister lives now. I kept thinking that I was there 20 years ago, in my bed by this point, thinking about how my life would never be the same now. 10 years old, and worrying about if I'd miss the first day of school the next year since she wouldn't be here to tell me to go. I'd never wake up and walk into the living room to find her curled up on the couch, drinking coffee in her pink satin robe.

I kept driving, past my sister's house, onto the next street. I drove slowly, looking at all the houses. Funny when you're a kid and you're always on your bike, how those houses that you know so well make you feel at home. Familiar. Tonight I drove by and was comforted by them. I got to a point in the road that I loved to coast down on my bike. When I was a girl, that hill was hard to climb. I'd do it, though, over and over again, just so I could turn around, pedal fast, wind whipping my hair, and coast back down.

It surprised me tonight to find that it was no more than a slight incline, and not a hill at all. It struck me that even though it looked different to me now, inside I felt the same. No matter what happens as the years go by, on this day, on this night, I will always be a 10-year-old girl.

When I got to the end of the road, the radio station started "Wish You Were Here" by Pink Floyd. I stopped, lit a cigarette in honor of all the poetic justice and everything, and drove home listening to it.

so
so you think you can tell
heaven from hell
blue skies from pain
can you tell a green field
from a cold steel rail
a smile from a veil
do you think you can tell

and did they get you to trade
your heroes for ghosts
hot ashes for trees
hot air for a cool breeze
cold comfort for change
and did you exchange
a walk-on part in the war
for a lead role in a cage

how I wish
how I wish you were here
we're just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl
year after year
running over the same old ground
what have we found
the same old fears
wish you were here



It's midnight here now. I made it.

~