Not Today

I was the girl crying in the kid’s section of the local Barnes & Nobel today, in case you were wondering.  Yeah, the one that left with tears in her eyes and sniffling up the running snot into her nose so it wouldn’t pour onto her lip. That was me.  and what caused it?  a book that I saw called “Grandma Loves You”.  I was innocently meandering the children’s section after I bought myself a nice coffee, looking for new books that I could get for my daughter and there it was.  And I cried.  I saw it and I don’t even remember what I thought but I know that I would have thought about buying that for my mom to read to Emily, and now I can’t.  Yes, she has another Grandma who loves her very much – that woman adores my daughter – but still.  I saw it and it made me think of my mom who is no longer here and I spontaneously cried; if she’s somewhere, I know she still loves my daughter, but she’s not here anymore and that part sucks.

I don’t expect sympathy, or empathy – whatever the right term is – I don’t cry in the middle of a book store for reaction purposes, that’s for sure.  It’s just like when my friend died five years ago.  I cried in Target when I saw her favorite cookies. I cried at a convenience store as I was waiting for a sandwich because I saw something about chicken with honey mustard sauce, which she used to get extra of when we went out to a diner.  The little things that she loved, the little details that I remember, that’s what makes me cry.  When I see those cookies now, sometimes I pause and look at them, and think to myself “I miss you man” and I move on; there are days that I linger a little too long in front of the bags of Milano cookies and I probably look a little strange as I stand there and smile at them.  And I know that will happen one day with the things I see that remind me of my mom.  But for now, I remain that girl that cries in the book store, the food store, the movies, the Target, her desk, her car and everywhere else in between.  One day it will be better, it will get easier, but today is not that day.