An Honest Answer

I've been prepping clients to testify for litigation for over ten years now. This can be a lawyer's worst trial nightmare if your client is a talker and can't bring themselves to believe that things like "I don't know", "I don't remember" or "Can you ask that again?" are all legitimate answers. When you force yourself to create answer when you really aren't sure can be dangerous ground.

I think it is something inherent in our DNA as people that when we are asked a question, we feel forced to give an answer. In this day of quick "Hi. How are yous?", I don't want to give a  long drawn out answer and the person hearing the response doesn't really want to listen to a dissertation about my problems either. We have settled for frosting covered niceness. Civility without the depth. I use to be a huge abuser of this trait. I would ask "How are you?" and hardly wait for the answer. I find this almost impossible to do anymore.
So I've started taking my own advice.

When I see someone in real life that I haven't seen since I lost my brother and they ask me "How are you?", I say the only thing I know how to say and be truthful:

"I don't know."

It is not a false statement. I really don't know how I am most days. Many mornings are blasted with the humdrum of soccer practice, dirty dishes, laundry, work and the daily functions that keep our little family in a rhythm. My kids need a steady beat of rhythm in normal circumstances. But these days, we all need even more than usual.

Some days are a fight to get out of bed. I want to lay down and cry and scream and break every piece of glass I can get my hands on. There are moments of sheer delight watching my kids throw themselves headlong into summer's glory and yet there are moments when I struggle to be around so much merriment. Moments some days are filled with thanksgiving for small gifts, like a sunrise or a new flower growing and some moments when I list my things for which I am grateful, I stare a blank paper.

The truth is that there is a void in my life. A void that can only be filled by a six foot tall,  gorgeously blue-eyed little brother who use to text me that I needed to cut back on the Twinkies because my butt was bigger than the last time he saw me. I've never wanted to be called fat so badly in all my life.
It is always going to hurt. There will always be a missing piece to my heart and family events will forever be a touch of sweet and sour.

My soul knows all the appropriate things to say to someone going through grief like me.

"He's in a better place."

"You will see him again."

"This life isn't forever."

And there are days that I can give myself a pep talk long enough that it works.

But for the days that I can't stop crying at ridiculous country songs or seeing his things in my house, I've given myself the grace to say "I don't know" how I am today and to believe that it is an honest answer. 

Musical Monday: If Heaven Weren't So Far Away

My little brother loved country music. The station in his truck is still set to his favorite country station.

I don't have the heart to change it. 

I may never. 

This song came on the radio today and I just lost it. 

If only heaven weren't so far away.

I would take a day trip all by myself. 

I'd want him to introduce me to Jesus personally.

And we'd spend the entire day with my baby bro telling me exactly how to live the rest 

of my life on earth with out him. 

I'd let Nannie lecture me one more time on how to be a good person. 

And to always remember to trust my gut instinct about all else.

Papa would hug me and say he'd leave a pot of coffee on for me. 

And I would cry all the way home.

At least it would be seeing them all in person.

And not only in my dreams. 

Needing To Break

One of the many reasons why my husband is so good for me is he balances the crazy.

I come to him with ridiculous ideas and he never tells me "No" flat out.

Most times he just redirects my crazy into something productive.

Some thing safer than my original version. 

Grief has been doing a number on me. 

Most days I don't have any tears, 

until I feel them rolling down my face.

Some mornings I want to eat a box of Twinkies for breakfast, 

only to clock five miles on the treadmill in the afternoon.

Screaming, crying, writing, eating and drinking all in excess haven't eased any part of my broken heart.

So I told The Hero last week that I wanted to start breaking things.

I wanted to watch glass hit and shatter and come apart.

Seeing beautifully decorated tables in magazines, leaves me wondering what all that pottery would look like broken on the floor. 

I told him that perhaps watching something else coming undone would help me feel.

Feel what I wasn't sure.

But I told him I needed to break.

In his perfectly, amazing way he came home a few days later with a giant bag of whole pecans.

"It's not plates or dishes, but I thought this would help."
I laughed.

On nights where I struggle most, I release my grip on doing dinner dishes,

grab my bag and bowl and head out to the porch.

A few nights ago, The Hero found me and asked if cracking pecans was any bit of a release for me.

I nodded. 

And then suggested he go by me my own pecan tree.

Being Drug Into Spring

It appears that Oklahoma has officially entered into spring.

Everything is changing colors.

The weatherman reports warmer temperatures are here to stay.

People are out walking their dogs, playing in the parks and buzzing with the hype of impending summer.

We are spending more time outside with soccer and gardening.

The thrill of watching things change and become green is still thrilling to the kids.

Promises of berries and jam, swimming and fun are all they talk about these days.

They have even braved getting in the swimming pool a couple of times already.

I want so badly to replicate their excitement. 

To get lost in the anticipation that comes with changing seasons.

I make myself spend time in the garden every day.

Some days, I just meander through, watering plants and pulling weeds.

Other days, I spend hours planting, pruning, working to utter exhaustion. 

Just so that I can be able to sleep.

But as much as I try, I just cannot bring myself to fully embrace the season change.

The last season you saw was the bitter cold of winter. 

And there is so much of my heart that is frozen from the ache of missing you.

I suppose that I deep down fear that welcoming spring, will mean I forget all about the last winter you lived. 

Seeing You

I saw you yesterday at the grocery store. It caught me by surprise at first, to see you standing there, but as I approached you from behind, I saw traces of your hair and your stance. I held my breath and rationalized to myself that it was not, in fact, you, but a person who faintly resembled you. It was my heart that wanted it so desperately to be you.

This is the status of my life these days.

Trucks that look similar to yours that pass me on the street, late-twenties boys who stand near me pumping gas; these things make me pause to doubt.

As I past this person with my shopping cart, I couldn't help but turn over my shoulder to make sure that it wasn't you. Do you think it's silly that I was actuly saddened that it wasn't you? Double check that it isn't indeed you. I may never again look at my phone and not wonder if it is you calling to chat or hear the "ding" of a text message and hope that it is you sending me a joke.

My child mentioned you at dinner a few nights ago. You know, that child of mine who loved you so. The one who climbed in your lap when you would visit and demand every bit of your attention? He said it so sweetly and innocently, I almost didn't notice. He could have asked me for more bread. But when The Hero reached for my hand, I knew the small one had said something about you. I asked him to repeat it. Slow. Soft.

"I miss Uncle Guy."

There were no tears in his eyes. No softened words. Just forward and truthful; like kids do.

Tonight the little one and I made dinner, filled our plates and was five minutes into watching The Voice. We were discussing hair styles and singing when he said "Mommy, I guess it's ok that Uncle Guy is in Heaven. I have two uncles and it doesn't matter that he is in Heaven. He is still my uncle."

I tried to hard not to let him see me cry. But my kids are use to me disappearing into the kitchen these days.
I guess I'm not the only one whose been missing you lately. I suppose the hole that you left in my life and in my heart was not only a hole for me, but for others too. I suppose I've just been so awash with my own grief and hurt looking for you that I hadn't much noticed. But it appears that we all are looking for you.

Grief Doesn't Come With A Handbook

It's a miracle that both of my parents are still sane. Having three kids under five must have been a circus most of the time. Heck, sometimes have two almost five years apart is more than my feeble mind can process. One thing I always remember my mom saying when we got in trouble or we were trying to reason through some family issue was "Maybe that was the wrong parenting move, but you guys didn't come with a handbook on how to parent you."
She's repeated the same thing to me when I became a parent and I would call her about whether or not some behavior issue of mine or my child(ren) was adoption related or a personality conflict.

"Linz, go with your gut because God doesn't bring kids with a handbook."

She wasn't kidding.

Grief is the damnest thing I've ever been dealt. It strikes me in the most inopportune, ridiculous places in a day. A parent screaming during my 5 year old's basketball game sent me into a full blown panic and a house full of guests playing cards, led me to crying in my bathroom. Neither of these instances have any explainable reasoning. Maybe it was the undue pressure parents were placing on their children during the game and perhaps it was the most merriment I had felt in weeks made me feel guilty, but grief is definitely getting the blame.

Just as children don't come with a handbook about parenting, neither does death have a guide for how we are supposed to grieve. Tears will find me in the oddest times and sadness can creep inside my heart while there is still a smile on my face. I sometimes catch myself wondering "is this normal? Am I supposed to react like that?" But then nothing about death and living with the loss of someone you love is normal and since no one has written the handbook on grief, I'm giving myself the grace to muddle my own way through.

Musical Monday: Charlie Hall's 'My Brightness'

I've loved this song for years, but every word of it has rung true yet again through this agonizing time.

Enjoy!

And Happy Musical Monday 

Funerals Are For The Living

 It was a Tuesday. The Oklahoma air was so cold it would take your breath at the inhale. My brother had left us two days earlier. It seemed like a lifetime and a mere second before Tuesday. Someone had suggested Thursday for the funeral, but my sister had more of her wits about her than I did in that moment and had objected. The weather was predicted to be thirty degrees warmer on Saturday. I think the weather was definitely a factor, but I think she believed that Saturday would give us more time.

Who wants to attend a funeral on Saturday? I knew I didn't. But nobody whose loved somebody deeply ever has a desire to attend their funeral. Yes, Saturday technically gave us a few more days to plan and to process, but the time that I wanted had already been taken from me. I wanted more holidays, more blazing hot summer Sundays out by the pool watching our kids play together and us laughing at some silly joke. But the only time I had left alloted to me was going to be without him. So Saturday it would have to be.

While my brother's life was honored that day, the entire process of burying the dead is really for those who are left behind. We choose flowers and caskets and burial plots, not for those who are being planned around, but for those who are standing there to see it. I'm not sure if knowing that makes the process better or worse. If for the better, than it is so we carry the remembrance of those we've loved and lost into a honor we want those who knew them to agree with. Perhaps though it is always for the worse, because after all the flowers have died and the casket is lowered, the dead's status remains unchanged and the hollowness of our hearts are all that remain.



 

Preaching An "I Miss You."

"Lindsey?"

Every one's eyes in the room were looking at me for the answer.

I wasn't sure I had heard the question.

"Huh?"

The last two days had been such a blur, I would often stare into space thinking I would awaken in a few moments and I would have only been dreaming. I often would pray that I was.

The funeral director was taking notes and we had come to the part of the meeting where we had to decide who was going to "officiate" my brother's funeral.

"I am."

I heard the words and then couldn't believe I had said them. Did I really think I could preach, officiate or even stand up during my baby brother's goodbye ceremony? But I had been thinking and praying about it a lot.

I had a number of people who would have gladly preached. We live in Oklahoma for crying out loud. I could have walked out of the front door of that funeral home and hit a pastor with a rock if I had wanted. There were at least four pastor's cell phone numbers in my purse.

But if we were all going to be gathered on a Saturday for an event no one wanted to be there for, let's not choose someone who my brother had never even met. If saying "see you soon" to the only baby brother I'd ever have was going to be the order of that day, I owed it to him as his big sister to do it myself. I couldn't think of another way.

The air must have escaped out of the room, because for a moment time stood still.
Mike, the funeral director, tried to reason with me.

"Have you thought about how hard this is going to be?"

I had.
I knew.
Did he know how hard it was knowing that my life as forever broken into two places: life with my brother and life without him?

A bad highlight reel had been playing in my head about the funerals I had attended where afterwards, I felt as though I knew the deceased less after hearing the same old hymns and dismal words said over a casket. If this were good night, it was going to be one of which my brother would have been honored to have played a part.

"I do. And I don't know that I can pull it off, but I have to try."

As we drove home, my sister looked at me through tears and said "If we have to do this, then we have to do it together. I'll be in charge of his graveside service."

I'm not sure what Laura and I said that Saturday afternoon. I know we both made it. Before I got up in front of that church, The Hero squeezed my hand and said "you've got this. You can do it. It's not goodbye; only 'see ya soon'."
My baby brother was so felt and present that day that Mike pulled Laura and I both aside afterwards and thanked us for letting him be a part of a funeral that was honorable and fitting for the "I miss yous" we were making.

And I guess that's a song my heart will sing for now until my last day because some days there are no other words than "I miss you."