Its cold inside.

Its Christmas eve.  Well it 4:33 in the morning and when everyone wakes up it will be Christmas eve day.  I can't sleep.  Noah was up all night, he is sick with the flu, we have all had it.   Elliott brought it home from pre-school.   I am recovering from it but still have that cough that is ugly and lingers forever.

The house is quiet, cold...and I am in your room your little brother sleeping soundly next me, and I am missing you like crazy.

There are days when I forget.  I don't forget you I just forget the hurt, I live here in the moment where the dishes are piled up and the laundry needs folding, a lunch needs to be packed, someone needs a ride, the turkey bacon is burning under the broiler...and I forget to be sad, I forget that I am doing this life thing without you.  Maybe I am not forgetting as much as just living.

Then there are days when it still hurts to breath.

Sometimes memories kind of linger around me, pull at me, ask me to pay attention to them, I  know if I follow them there will be tears...but I must because that's what I have and some part of me thinks its you saying "Hey mom I am still  here, remember this...remember when..."  And I do baby, I remember all of it.

Yesterday I was remembering the shower and it brought me to my knees.  That shower is gone now, replaced by a new one but I wrote to you in the steam anyway.  You loved water, it gave you such comfort.  This is something you and I share, water calms us, it neutralizes everything, it is home.

You know I hate Christmas.  Not my favorite holiday but you kids loved it so much so I tried to make it magical, when we had plenty and when we had little.  You my little elf loved it most.  You made it so much fun.

The last Christmas we had with you hurt like hell, it was pitiful, we slept in the hospital, on the floor, on chairs, in the waiting room.  We pretended...it hurt, I knew it was our last.

I try to make it special for the boys and your sister who is 31 still gets excited for Christmas morning, she loves her stocking and a pile of presents, it squeezes my heart.

I don't put your stocking up...its strange it feels wrong.

It will be a good Christmas, Elliott finally understands it and he is so excited.  He is sure Santa is coming even though he has spent a fair amount of time in the naughty chair this year.  Your Dad showed him the three stooges and they like to watch videos where people bump into walls, slip on ice, the christmas tree falls on gramps or someone falls into the birthday cake...so you can guess what kind of trouble he gets into.  He is a sweet boy but he is a handful.

The tree is red this year.  I let Elliott choose.  The ribbon is red and white polka dots, we pulled out all the red balls, the white snowball ornaments, and any of the christmas past ornaments that were red.  Elliott got a furry puppy, kitty. and duck ornament to put on the tree, he keeps taking them off and putting them back on.  He loves it.  He has scattered fake snow all over the house, smashed all the tangerines, licked all the chocolates, pulled all the pompoms off the stockings, and made tiny pesky holes in all his presents.

The tree is new, we got it last year, a cheap fake tree with white lights, nice and narrow so it fits in our tiny living room.  I didn't feel like a tree topper this year, your angel is still wrapped in tissue in the box.  I couldn't pull it out, I just couldn't.

Tonight Aly will come over after work, we will make stuffed chicken breasts, scallop potatoes, roasted broccoli and bake a loaf of bread.  TT and Anthony will come over and we will exchange presents.  Early Christmas morning we will wake up and open presents.  It will be nice.

I need to sleep, if I don't I will be crabby and ruin it all.

Stevie I feel like I am failing at everything.  Your dad and I are a mess, we are two people living in the same house...I am my worst person on most days.  My parenting is me just being here but not really being here.  Some part of me is tired.  I am holding on to hope, because that is what I do, I write stories in my journal about how things are going to be better, how magic is going to happen, how there can still be a happy ending...

I need change...good change.

I am going into the studio to make art for me.  I am ready to get back to it.  Elliott will be in preschool until summer then will start Pre-k that means I will have four hours in the studio five days a week.  I am looking forward to creating again, really going for it.  Maybe that is the change I need.

Sarah is sick.  I am guessing if there is a heaven, and you are watching us from time to time then you know.  She has Cancer.  I want to wrap her tiny bird self up in my arms and protect her but I know I can't, and honestly that woman is made out of much stronger stuff than me I think.  She is brave.  She sent me an angel for Christmas, a girl with wings, butterfly in her hands...she is sick but sending me love and angels.  I don't know how it works were you are but could you stay close to her, could you help her find the doctors and treatment she needs, keep her strong, don't let her be afraid.  I am sure Annie is close by and he dad but she needs all the angels.  You know Sarah she likes to go big!  She loved us so well when you were sick, when we needed her.

I wish you were here.  I wish we had gone shopping and baked cookies.  I wish we bought odd ornaments for the tree and you would be opening presents tomorrow with your sister and brothers.  I wish...I wish...I wish...

I have to believe you are somewhere, and everyday feels like Christmas.  The sky is warm and pink, the ocean is turquoise and there are dolphins you get to swim with.  There are meadows with yellow tulips and red poppies, unicorns for fun.  You walk barefoot on soft grass, fall asleep under giant redwood trees.  You are surrounded by all the things you love and there is music, the most beautiful music.  Maybe there is a big crystal ball where you live and once in a while you peek in at us and laugh and wonder and wait...

I am here baby where I have always been, I can't give you a Christmas present, I can't wake you up and tell you Santa is here, I can't make you hot chocolate and cookies, I can just lay here in your room and love you where ever you are and hope you feel it and know it.

I miss you so much, so very much.

I love you Stevie.

Merry Christmas.

Nine

Nine years.

I just don't even know how its possible.

The moon will be full tonight, I will stand bare feet in grass and look up at it, pretend it is a magical portal to where ever you are now and I will talk to you, say all the same things I always say.  I will tell you how much I love and miss you, I will ask you to come visit me and let me know you are ok...

I put pink tulips on your grave this year, they only had one big yellow, I bought that one too.  I filled in with some darker pink ice land poppies.   I scrubbed, cleaned, weeded, and even cut grass with scissors and gave myself blisters before I realized that it was a silly thing to do.  They haven't mowed in a while and overgrown feels forgotten and you are not forgotten.

Tending your grave is very primal, it is all I have left to do for you.

I don't cry much there, sometimes not at all.  That precious body keeps me coming back to honor and remember, out of respect and the need to be close to you in anyway I can but I don't feel "you" there.  I feel you here at home with me...sometimes.

I posted a photo of you to Facebook.  I really needed the support.  People are busy and for them nine years is a long time but it only takes a few minutes to say something kind and it makes all the difference to me.  The outpouring was more than I hoped for, I am grateful.

Your sister bought me Paul Simon tickets, please be there with us.

I love you sweet girl.  

Come visit me tonight, wake me up, we will sit by the new fountain and you can tell me stories, I want to know all of it, everything, don't leave any parts out.

Mama

I try to take a deep breath and I can't.  For no reason in particular I am transported back into a moment in time, it can be a sad one or a beautiful one but the affect is the same.  I can't breath.
Tears come hot and fast, I feel a trembling inside me that feels like I might be breaking apart and I wrap my arms around myself to hold me together, and I let the seconds loop, I have to its all I have and I would rather have that and the pain then to not have it at all.  The memories keep me alive but they are painful so painful.

There is a scene in "What Dreams May Come" Robin Williams plays a guy who has crossed over and but he loves and misses his wife so much that instead of living in his heaven he follows her as a ghost.  He does everything he can to communicate with her in her grief, and she is deep in it.  The closer he gets the worse it is for her until one day she screams out loud for him to leave her alone.  He leaves her...she kills herself to be with him.

I need to be here, as much as I wish to be with you I know you need to live in your heaven and I need to live here with your brothers and sister and do what the universe has asked of me, to be a mother.  So I tell myself that those moments when I can't breath are you are simply passing through trying to tell me you are still here and even though it hurts, it only hurts because I miss you so fucking much.  I will never ask you to leave me alone.

Today it happened.  I opened the blog and a photo I have not seen in a long time popped up and I got dizzy, my chest tightened, the most pitiful sound escaped and I was done for.  Now I am pulled together and I am writing because it feels better than crying.  Thank you sweet girl.  I see you, I feel you, and I miss you.  I have not forgotten, I will never forget.

The sky turns pink, the seasons change, everyday more grey hair and wrinkles.  Your clothes are still in the closet and they are soft and still have the imprint of you on them, I touch them and smell them and I can imagine you right there in that room like it was yesterday.

Please God be real.  Please Stevie be there waiting for me when its my time, promise me you will be there.  Please be happy sweet girl in your heaven where white ponies wander around in fields of poppies, where there is a concert every night under stars...you don't have to wear shoes, your clothes are soft, your hair long, hip glasses just because, and long days at the beach with friends with huge umbrellas and picnic baskets, laughter and soft waves, singing dolphins in the distance.

I see you falling asleep in Heavens library surrounded by every story ever written...

I love you, I love you, I love you....deep breath.

February ending...

It has been unusually warm this February, high 70's clear skies, sweater nights.  I love this weather but its winter and we need rain, so although I  enjoy sitting out in the yard drinking ice tea  and watching your little brother dig in the sand there is part of me that knows I won't be able to water the lawn again this year and I shouldn't bother planting a veggie garden.  There are more important things to worry about but these are the things I think about with my toes in the grass that won't stay that green for long.

I had my physical today.  I think of you when I have to do things I find unpleasant or scary like go to the dentist for a filling replacement or have a pap smear.  I think of you all the time but when I am afraid I think about how brave you were, you didn't have a choice, and it helps me suck it up and stop being such a wimp.  When things are really scary like being wheeled into the operating room for an emergency appendectomy thats when I hold your hand.

God I miss you Stevie, you have no idea how much.  The moon was full the other night and I was out walking, and I just slipped out of my body and wrapped myself around every memory of you.  I cried and walked and cried some more, all the while talking to you about how much laundry I did that day, how your brother is having a major break-out, and that I made the best chicken soup ever on sunday.  It was dark, surreal, comforting and very painful all at the same time.  This is what grief looks like almost 9 years later.

Noah is doing some amazing things, I think you are helping make things happen, I don't know how but I feel you in it.

Aly is doing great, she is a grown up now.  I am proud of her.  She misses you so much.  She can't talk about you without falling apart.

Elliott is getting so big so fast, you would love him.

I haven't been out to the cemetery for a while.  When you left I went every Thursday, then on the 19the of every month, then just special days...I sometimes worry that you think I have forgotten you, I hate graves with faded flowers from a holiday long past.  I will visit you in April, bring the tulips, bring something to make the brass plate shiny again, and maybe some art.  I found a bag of clay and I cleaned off my old work bench, I am thinking of making you a big snail with wings, see I don't forget.

My faith is different now Stevie, I am not sure what I believe anymore.  The thought of you not   being anywhere, that our 19 years was all there was ever going to be, that you are not somewhere in a heaven of your own waiting for me, that you won't be the one to bring me home is too much to bear.  So I hold on to part of the God fairytale I was raised with because it comforts me I am not sure anymore, that is scary.

I wish you were here.  I wish you had a cute little apartment  somewhere in Berkeley with a roommate or a boyfriend and I could come and visit, we could cook and talk and I would tidy up for you, feel like a mama.  I wish we were swapping books, sitting in a coffee shop talking about work and life,  I wish we could plan vacations and holidays, I wish I could just wake up in the morning and know where you are.

This is the life I have, this is what I must endure, I have to find happiness even though I am broken, I have to love even though my heart aches.  I have to keep believing that this isn't all there is.

Stay close sweet girl, keep whispering in my ear, help me find things, come to me in my dreams and let me look into those eyes.

February is ending, March will come and then April...nine years.