Morning on our little hill.
The alarm sounds at 7:00 a.m. and I moan at Alexa to "stop alarm". Sleep comes and goes throughout the night. I'm lucky to get four hours by the time Alexa screams at me to wake up. Nevertheless, I get up. Brush my teeth and throw my hair up into a ponytail just in time to greet the first of two children who are waking up for school. They always, always come to my room first thing every morning. This is nothing new. I greet them with an exuberant smile before putting my arms round them for a good morning hug and a, "Well good morning! Where've you been all my life?!" to which they usually reply with a sleepy "Uggghhhh."
I take my cocktail of mental meds before making myself a protein shake as well as breakfast for the kids. Jacob wants eggs. Ella, a bagel with strawberries.
Fourth grade math takes place in the first hour of school. I swear, that stuff is the very same math that I "learned" in high school. Ooof. But, we're getting it out of the way fast. The rest of the school day should run smoothly...I hope. His teachers are the best, though. I couldn't do this without em.
My daughter, who has Selective Mutism, comes out of her room with tears in her eyes...again. Her ELA teacher has absentmindedly (or maybe for the sake of challenging my girl to climb out of her shell?) asked her to present in class, again, so she's left the class and shut her chromebook. Trying to escape as quickly as possible. She carries her favorite soft blanket and throws herself onto the couch and hides her face under it. Soon after, my phone notifies me of an e-mail that's come in from one precious Special Ed case manager who already knows what's going on and wants to make sure my girl is okay. She usually throws a little bit, in every e-mail, that leads me to believe that she's getting really tired of having to explain the IEP to the same teacher, over and over. I mean, we're talking once a week. Come on, lady. I'm trying to give you the benefit of the doubt, but we've got three months of school left. How do you not get it, at this point? If I've not done a good enough job at it, please educate yourself of the world that is Selective Mutism.
After handling that obstacle, I make lunch. As I serve them at the big table that once occupied many, they ask, "What's for dinner, tonight?" This always makes me chuckle briefly before sighing in slight vexation. Cooking has become my least favorite chore in his passing. I joke, "Ummmm, I'm thinkin liver and onions." My ten year old shows the most disdain to my response, despite the fact that he knows that his mother hates liver and would NEVER cook/serve it. My girl looks at me blankly. She's over this joke. That just makes me laugh harder. My laughter makes her smile, finally, so I feel like I've accomplished something.
I check my messages and I've gotten another one from the sweet widow who lost her husband the same week as I, to covid. Her message to me, like always, is completely relatable. She walked by the men's department at Kohl's today, and thought of her fella. Took me back to a morning where I came across a concert tour date schedule for Big Daddy Weave, two months after Darrell passed away and I said, "Oooo, I need to send this to him so we can get tickets!" only to remember that he was gone. I've had several instances like that. As time goes by, those are happening less and less, though. I message her back before praying for her precious heart. I'm thankful that God crossed our paths, despite the reasons why.
Someone opens the front door and the dog runs out before anyone can stop him. I put on a sweater and shoes and grab my keys and head out to get him. That blasted dog.
Towels. Two loads of towels, today, in fact. I had a little bit of a set back over the weekend that had me down for a few days, so I had some making up to do today. Why this is the most cathartic chore, I'll never know. But I drift off into my own thoughts as I diligently fold each towel as neatly as my mama taught me to do as a young girl. I'm thinking about him walking through the front door, after work. He always, always, always had a closed mouth smile on his face when he walked through that door, from work. He'd hug the kids and kiss me on my waiting lips. Every day. Without fail. I'm pulled away from my thoughts by my ten year old who wants to know what "Sectionalism" means. He's learning about the Civil War. Come on, foggy brain. Jump into "How to explain this word to a fourth grader"mode.
School is over. I'm greeted again with the question, "What's for dinner, Mama?" I'm beginning to hate dinner all together. I open the fridge and eyeball the ground beef perched on the top shelf waiting for me to do something inventively clever with it, before deciding that we're having an uneventful night of beef tacos, tonight. The kids are pleased with this idea, though, so score one for mom. It's still early though so I fill a short amount of time on the elliptical. I'm interrupted by a request for project help for homework. I'm not entirely bothered by the interruption, though. I wasn't really in it to win it, on that elliptical, anyhow.
My phone dings and rings almost continuously, it seems. The dogs yelp and snarl at the delivery man who just dropped off my Walmart order. He, once again, yells out a "Thank you!!!", as he does a little dance while choosing a snack and drink out of the basket I've left on the front porch for him. The basket is replenished often as I get out less for shopping then I did before covid and before losing him. I pick and choose which texts I want to respond to, before returning a phone call. I think to myself that I really need to wash windows and almost decide to forgo cooking all together so that I can complete that task, only to decide to leave it for the weekend. My crazy pup attacks the package with over-dramatized and unnecessary ferociousness, as I pick it up to bring it into the house. The kids and I empty the contents of the box into their necessary places and I begrudgingly start cooking.
As the beef sizzles, I sit at the table looking up little adventures to take the kids on, for their winter break. The thought of an adventure is exciting but it brings on anxiety, nonetheless. He went on every adventure with us. I feel slightly empowered, though, at the thought of doing it on my own. Where to take them, though, is still the lingering question.
Dinner is served and relatively uneventful. It's just three of us where there once sat seven for dinner. Jacob tells a "punny" joke that makes me laugh hysterically. Ella rolls her eyes, but laughs a little anyway. We clean up dinner dishes and play a game of Uno. I win but nobody gets upset about this. I pull out a regular deck of cards and attempt to teach them how to play rummy. Darrell and I could play for hours, with the music on. One of us would make it to a score of 1,000 and he'd say, "Let's play to another 500." The kids don't completely grasp the concept so we decide to try another day.
Gabriel's learned a new song and asks me to take a listen. I always enjoy those times with him. He wrote a song for me as a Christmas gift. Most beautiful gift I've ever received. I can't wait until he records it so that I can share it.
We're watching Marvel movies, in order of story line. We've made it to The Avengers. We've seen it before, but according to Jake, "We have to go in order even if that means watching a movie again." I oblige because it's an easy way to make him happy. We watched the first half last night. We finish the rest before bed. Jacob still cuddles me, when we watch movies, and I relish in this. He's my last baby, afterall.
I ask them if they have anything that they would like to pray about tonight. He says, "I just want to ask God if he'll tell Daddy that we love him and pray for my teacher because she sounded sick today. I hope it's not Covid." We pray and they hug and kiss me goodnight. Ella has a tendency of walking away after a hug and coming right back for another one. This has been the norm, with her, since she was itty bitty. It always made her dad chuckle as he'd welcome her in for another embrace.
I straighten up the couch cushions and put the dogs in their beds. The glow of the tv lights up a quiet living room and I linger a little longer than normal because I dread going into my empty bedroom at the end of every night. My bedroom is clean. None of his discarded socks on the floor, on his side of the bed. I've changed things a little, since he left, so it feels more like my space, but his spirit fills the room, nonetheless, and it's palpable. I tell him that I miss and love him before turning on my playlist to fill the empty silence. After finishing my nightly routine of teeth brushing and face washing, I climb into bed and turn my back purposefully to avoid looking at his side. The music lulls me to sleep where I constantly pray to catch a glimpse of him again.
"Maybe life is all about twirling under one of those midnight skies, cutting a swathe through the breeze and gently closing your eyes." -Sanober Kahn
Side note: This took me three days to complete. Being overwhelmed with tasks and interruption is something that I was already accustomed to functioning with, but becoming a widow has bumped things up several notches. I'm trying to accommodate for both of our roles, and constantly praying I'm getting it right while knowing that I'm going to fall short somewhere. I took for granted all the little things that he did. Trash, yard work, grilling, changing light bulbs in the high light fixtures, car maintenance, etc. Holding me at the end of the night, telling me it's all going to be okay, helping me to raise our kids...gosh, I miss him. I'm happy to have this outlet to escape to, even if it's just merely for the sake of my own sanity.
My comfort in my suffering is this; Your promise preserves my life.
