Stay

I’ve been sad a lot this week. Some of it has to do with my son, Newt, turning nine years old. All I can think is that nine is half of eighteen, so mathematically speaking, we’re half done (although in reality, I’m sure he’ll be sick of me long before that). And then there’s the guilt. Because like many moms who get annoyed on a regular basis, I constantly fluctuate between wishing the kids would leave me alone and agonizing over the fact that my time with them is quickly slipping away (I’d say all moms do this, not most, but I read certain blogs and am convinced that some people must either be way nicer than I am or on much better meds).

Anyway, what’s really got me down this week is my mom. I miss my mom. This is the third birthday Newt will be celebrating without her. He was five when we first heard the news that her cancer was back. I can still remember her, standing in my family room at Newt’s party and reassuring my husband and me. I remember what she was wearing. I remember how she looked when we all sang “Happy Birthday” in a whisper because the party wasn’t on Newt’s actual birth day, so he thought we should sing it “small.”

Yesterday, I took the kids to some loud, bouncy, arcade-y place that’s meant to torture sane, adult humans. Anyway, as I sat there, waiting for them to finally drop dead from hypoglycemia and fluid loss (I really didn’t feed them much in the morning), I watched a grandmother with her grandson. She didn’t do anything remarkable that anyone else would’ve noticed. She just hugged him in a way that my mom would’ve hugged my kids. And damn. It really hurt.

I don’t think I realize how much I block out the fact that my mom is gone until something slaps me in the face like that. I just go along my day, pretending I haven’t called her in a while. And then I get some tiny reminder that she’ll never be calling me back. She’ll never know what an amazing kid Newt’s become. She’ll never see his comics or hear him sing or read his stories about robots. She’ll never come to another birthday party.

And worst of all, Newt will never see her face light up when he walks into a room to let him know that he’s the most special boy in the world.

So that’s why I’m sad this week. Memories that I assumed would be fading away by now have managed to stay as fresh and vivid as the day they happened. But I’m grateful. I don’t want to forget. In many ways, it’s the forgetting that makes me saddest of all.

Because really, I don’t want her to go away again.