Gee, thanks Hallmark

I can add Hallmark to my list of stores I’ve cried in in the last week.  That was me, the girl in the aisle looking at ornaments and then some other stuff – what, I don’t remember – with tears in her eyes who, at one point, had to take out a tissue.  A very old tissue, at that.  Yeah, that was me.  It’s December 1^stand while the world is merrily hanging up their lights, putting up their trees, taking out the Menorahs and candles, I’m crying in Hallmark.  Yeah, happy holidays indeed.

I wasn’t walking around there on purpose, searching for some item to make me cry.  Hi, it’s hard to avoid the big MOM sign directly next to the Dad cards.  I didn’t pick any up, I didn’t even read any of the fronts.  Knowing that they were there, and this year I wouldn’t be buying one, was enough; its actually a very strange feeling to know that I won’t buy one.  Seeing the ornaments that I would have bought for her – she loved Tigger from Winnie the Pooh – and smelling the candles that she loved was also enough (I didn’t actually pick any of those up either, the smell is quite strong over by where the ornaments are).  Anything that had “Grandma” written on it was just icing on the cake.

I can’t believe it’s already December.  How did we get here already??  Sometimes it feels like just yesterday I was fighting with her over going to the doctor, making the CT appointment, ranting to my sister about how stubborn she was.  But it wasn’t just yesterday.  It wasn’t just yesterday that I heard her voice for the last time, or that I saw her light up when my daughter walked into the house.  And it wasn’t just yesterday that I knew she wouldn’t be here now.  It was almost a year ago, and that’s a tough pill to swallow.  I know that my journey is far from over; this is a life-long road and things will become manageable, things will become easier in some regards but they will never be “okay”, they will never be “normal” again.  Both are long gone; I left them in that hospital room, in that funeral home, in that mausoleum.  I think they left the building when I told the nurse to order the morphine; I’m pretty sure that’s the moment my “normal” went away.  And where I am now on this journey is a place that feels all too familiar – I am sad a lot, I am difficult a lot, I am a bitch a lot even though I don’t mean to be. I replay those days in my head, feeling guilty for not doing enough or for the things that I had to do because no one else could.   I feel alone a lot, and I cry a lot more than I have in a while.  I’ve been here before (maybe this is a bad real-life version of Monopoly and I just got sent to Jail).  I’m hoping that this time around, I come out the other side a bit more relieved, a bit happier, a bit more myself than I have been lately.  I wish I could just put on a happy face for everyone around me so I didn’t snap their heads off for stupid reasons like leaving the butter out on the counter all morning or for throwing a bit of a fit when they don’t get their way.  But I can’t do it.  No matter how hard I try, the happy face doesn’t seem to fit these days without busting the stitching and there’s no one around to sew up the seams anymore.