Tonight's picture was taken in July of 2003. Mattie was a year old. This was Mattie's first trip to the Outer Banks of NC. Peter and I loved going to the Outer Banks and we wanted to introduce the beach to Mattie early on. In true Mattie style, he did not like the beach for the first two years we visited it. However, by the third year, he began to love playing in the sand and the sound of the water crashing on the shore no longer scared him. Mattie had a strong personality, and I learned early on that persistence was the key to parenting him. I am happy that we persisted, because Mattie learned to love the water, building in the sand, and collecting seashells. All things that in my mind should be a part of a child's life. I still have many of his wonderful collections, and recently when I went with Ann to visit Charlotte's family by the beach, I brought home a huge pine cone. I am sure they all thought it was odd, because I did not explain why I was dragging this pine cone home. But the reasoning is plain and simple. The pine cone was something that Mattie would have honed in on and collected, and therefore, I collected it in memory of him and our trips together.
Poem of the day: Time Does Not Heal by Charlie Brown
Time does not heal
All wounds
It puts a lid
That sits lightly
On swallowed feelings
Of overwhelming grief
Sometimes that container
Has room for tears
And sometimes it is full
With hard, knotted anger
That cannot be voiced.
My heart holds both more
And less,
Than I thought possible.
Charlie's poem today sums it up beautifully. Or at least the analogy worked for me. Time is like a jar or a bottle. In this bottle sits my grief, my fears, my anger, and most of my emotions. Some days, the lid on the jar can open a bit to allow more feelings and thoughts inside. However, on most days in order to function the jar remains sealed. Lately, since I have been home feeling ill, I have found that it is harder to keep the jar sealed, and therefore, moments of intense sadness and bouts of crying slip out.
I woke up this morning with a fever and a cough. Because I was concerned that my recovery was slow and that we are moving into the July 4th weekend, I decided I better make an appointment at my doctor's office. Ann checked in with me, and she wanted Tanja to drive me to the doctor, but I decided to drive myself. It is funny, since Mattie developed cancer, I have much more strength to do things I never thought I could do before. While I was getting ready this morning, I was listening to the radio. The radio announcer was talking about the new George Strait song, and she told her audience that when we hear it, we should have tissues with us. I couldn't understand exactly what she was talking about, so I looked up the song she was referring to. I attached the link below in case you wanted to hear the song. The title of the song is, The Breath You Take. In the chorus of the song, is the line, "Life’s not the breaths you take, But the moments that take your breath away." I found this song very meaningful because it talks about the true purpose and mission in our lives. It is NOT the minutia, but instead the moments that capture our hearts and minds. For Peter and I what took our breaths away has now disappeared from our lives. So in a way Mattie's death leaves us with an existential crisis. What is the point our lives now?
George Strait's........ The Breath You Take
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VS5X2V5s58A
Visiting the doctor was an uneventful but tiring trip. She did not like the look of my throat, and therefore did a strep culture, which came out negative. So she deduced that I must have the flu. Apparently there is a strain of flu going around this summer, and I am the lucky one to catch it. She seems to think I will be feeling better by Sunday at the latest. I have two days of antibiotics to still take, but one thing is for sure, my head is heavy, I can barely keep my eyes open, and I have absolutely no energy at all.
This afternoon, as I have done for the past two days, I tuned into Little House on the Prairie. Today's episode just happened to be the one Karen and Peter told me about yesterday, when the eldest daughter in the family who is 15 years of age, becomes blind. For two hours I was glued to this show. I watched the parents deal with hearing this news about their daughter, Mary. I observed how Mary dealt with this news about her eyes and her future, and then had the opportunity to see how through education Mary was retrained to read and appreciate her life. It was a very heart warming and at the same time emotionally laden story. I went through seven tissues while watching this show, and had a royal headache after it was over. In one of the episodes, the father of Mary goes to church and his priest starts to talk with him. The priest says that God hears all our prayers, though our prayers are not always answered in the way we want. But that God has a reason for everything that happens. Clearly in this episode the purpose of Mary becoming blind was so that she would go to school and then help other children who are blind learn these same skills and function independently. Naturally this was a Hollywood moment, because in real life, the true lesson that God has in store for us isn't always clear, or at least not revealed SO quickly. I have no idea why Mattie was taken from Peter and I, and right now even if that secret was revealed, I am not sure I would care to or be open to hearing it.
Today was a day full of crying, as it related to my own feelings and those I observed. Karen asked me through e-mail why I torture myself in this way by watching such sad stories. The answer is, I am not sure. But I find it fascinating that I have never watched this show growing up, but now I tune into it, and it highlights all the issues I am contending with. It seems too coincidental for me. Based on all the crying I was doing today, Ann text messaged me and told me she was going to come over to deliver me more tissue boxes. It was the way she said it that made me laugh!
When Peter got home from work today, he made us dinner and we ate outside on the deck. We chatted about his day. He knew all about my day already, since I updated him periodically. I am happy Peter has a three day weekend, however, like any holiday, the fourth of July is also problematic for us. Actually any holiday without Mattie is hard. For many years we celebrated the fourth of July on the beach in North Carolina. Mattie loved all the excitement of seeing fireworks over the water. In certain years when we weren't in North Carolina, we celebrated the holiday in DC. One of the beauties of living in the city is right in our backyard we can see the amazing DC fireworks on the Mall. Mattie loved this fact, and this year as we will be home, I can't decide what we will be doing. The fireworks and festivities no longer have the same meaning for me.
I would like to end tonight's posting with a message from my friend, Charlie. Charlie wrote, "I read what Nancy wrote about being ill from doing something for yourself. It reminded me of what one of the instructors said about squeezing toxins and stress out of the body when practicing. They have to go somewhere and so I presume they circulate in the body, and make one ill until your immune system (and perhaps medications) help remove them. It likely is the same with the massage. The stress and the grief sit in places within until you work them out and in their departure, they come to make one ill before they are banished (for a time). It is terribly uncomfortable but holding it all in, is more destructive in the long run. I really appreciated Nancy's poem as well; there are no answers to "why" but we all know you did everything you could and your head knows that too, even if your heart can't admit that. Animals are more sensitive than we like to admit and Patches clearly knows when you need her care. As I practice today I will continue to send you healing energy for both your heart and your body. I hold you gently in my thoughts."
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