friday 4:46 pm est
Airports are fine places to blog I have decided. Filled with cathartic chatter and background noise and a multitude of people with a story. Some leaving, some arriving. Some filled with anticipation, some with dread. Where one is saying goodbye, one is saying hello. I am fully aware of the complexity of this place. The enormous variety of history around me. The complicated mess of some, and the tidy reservedness of others. I feel at home here in such a paradox. After all, I sometimes feel like a walking paradox.
But today is filled with complications of its own for me. Some too difficult to write about just yet, or properly articulate.
Without going in to detail, the relationship with my mom is difficult. Complicated. I wish it were not, but yet, it is. Today I am on my way to her. She is not well, and her heart is being repaired. And never before have I been filled with so many mixed emotions. And with the very real possibility that she and I may never share conversation again or hug again, I haven’t yet gotten a handle on the feelings. My relationship with my mom is a paradox of its own. It always has been. God may have authored my story, but she is the book jacket. She has held all of my pages within her. And chapter after chapter, we are still mother and daughter.
I remember some really sweet moments between her and I. Brushing each others long hair, singing out of sync to loud music in the car, eating popcorn while watching a black and white tv on the living room floor. At times we only had basics, but we had each other. Later in life, moments she gave advice, encouraged me, cheered me on, and celebrated me. She would go to great lengths to order my favorite birthday cake, a rare pink champagne. While she could often be my biggest critic, she has also been my biggest fan. I am her only child; her 'love child'. A welcomed token of the young love between her and my dad. So it is no surprise I have always felt a pressure on me to be her everything. Her world. And when I have resisted being her world, or cannot measure up to that, things tend to get messy.
With all the fond memories I have, there are also many dark ones. There has been pain, abuse, addiction, control and manipulation. We can be each others own worst enemy. Tragic really, how those have grown and spread and morphed into deeply rooted bitterness. At times the painful memories of dysfunction have overshadowed the loving ones and for that I have regret.
I should have kept only the sweet things and spit out the rest.
But instead I vacillate between them both in a constant state of friction and contradiction. Never feeling justified to feel either because the other memories are there in the background. Oh the invalidation of it all. Longing for a firm position either way, I seek peace. The disconnected parts that don’t line up together are making me exhausted and weary.
Nothing in the relationship with my mom has ever lined up properly; like having a pebble in my shoe, or ruminating over some riddle I can’t solve. There is always a tension I can’t quite put my finger on. We are kindred spirits who share a history, though much of the history has been abandoned. We are like misaligned buttons on the same beautiful blouse. But for today, on my way to her, I choose sweet. I am spitting out the rest. None of that matters now. Now we need reconciliation. There is healing to be had.
friday 7:38 pm cst
That first part was written just 2 hours ago, as I awaited my departing flight in Knoxville headed to Reno to be with my mom. Now just hours later, I am in the Dallas/Ft. Worth airport, writing my grief out. My mother just passed. I was not able to get there in time. I learned of her death while sitting here alone, in the midst of more complicated background noise. And unsuspecting, unaffected people move all around me.
Oh, how God works I sometimes just cannot understand.
So here I am, waiting to go to where my mother is no longer. I had been so eagerly looking forward to praying over her, reading the Bible at her hospital bedside. Wanting to make sure she knew how much Jesus loved her. How much I loved her. The last urgent opportunity to share the gospel with her after so many previous failed attempts.
I am utterly wrecked with complications of the situation. My stepfather does not want me coming, does not want to see any family. He wants to be alone. There is no access to anything to remind me of my mom. All gone. Like she is now, just gone.
Now left to grapple with the reality that I will not only never have the relationship I longed for with her, but her and I will never sit together and talk about Jesus- which I always held out hope for. That so heavily breaks my heart. Because in our paradox of a complicated relationship, all I truly wanted was for her to know Him. To know she was loved by a good Father. I would toss away all the good memories I had with her if only she had surrendered to Christ. And maybe she did in her last moments…I simply do not know.
So this is now a tangled and fragmented blog post. Because I am leaving it all here on the page before I even process it, having lost sight of what it was supposed to be about in the first place. The initial thoughts feel irrelevant. Now there is just this left; my moms death.
My husband lost his mother two months ago. It was such a sweet time, her passing. I say that because God was glorified; she was prayed for, she understood Jesus and my husband made the trip to see her just in the nick of time. It was such a beautiful gift. I am so grateful for that.
Many of our friends have lost parents in the last year or two as well. I guess we are at that age now, where losing our parents is a thing. It is never easy, regardless of the health of the relationship.
There just aren’t any more words at the moment. I am trying to find the light y’all. Trying to be a light, trying to see the light. The light of the Lord is what I am searching for at this moment. The room is dark. But I know there is a light switch somewhere in here.
No matter the feelings in this moment, I know with all I am that He is here, with me. And He also authored my moms story, regardless of how it ended. And that is enough.
sunday, 3:58 pm est
It has been unusually quiet in my house. I don't mean noise in the manner you might think. But quiet in my heart, spiritually. Ugh. The valley.
But today I was able to cry out and hear from the Father. Things are still broken in me but light is peaking through. In this moment, gratitude. I hear the whispers. What if my not making it to her in time was His mercy in some way? Yes, I can see that and it makes me grateful. What if her two weeks of suffering in the hospital was also for her good? Was He bringing her to a sobering truth in His own way and time? Did she cry out to Him in her last moments? Oh how I hope.
Behold, I am the Lord, the God of all flesh. Is anything too hard for me? Jeremiah 32:27
What is clear is that I can not know the details- and do not have that privilege. It is not about me. Again I remind myself. What is important is how we live and love today, while we can. How we trust that the story has its own perfect ending even when we don't much like the last line. Sometimes we don't like whole chapters. And that's ok. Just keep your eyes set on the sweet stuff...hang on to the memories that reflect love, and spit out the rest. Prune the tree often of unneeded branches that bring forth no fruit.
Love, even when its hard, and let that replace the complications that can damage the heart.
As I continue processing these things, check out part two...a perfect ending.
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