For Thor - 4 - Tsunami Ambush

Thor, even if it was a short-lived respite yesterday, I thank you for it.  I caught a glimpse of how this will eventually be made right. It felt good to have that vantage point where I could see where I am going. For just a few moments, I could rest in the knowledge that I have a course. It is not an easy course, but I am not lost. I can head into that blasted landscape; that sea of grief with direction and purpose. And with you by my side as my most loving guide.

I was ambushed in the kitchen. I was cleaning the counter and washing cups from morning coffee. The warm sudsy water and the smell of dish soap were soothing to me.  The next thing I knew I was doubled over, trying to catch my breath. Great wracking sobs shook me and your dad swooped in to keep me from falling. Oh, yes. I was heading for the floor. Your Dad is strong, Thor. And your brother, too. I am pretty sure they thought I was having a heart attack. They held me as this agony washed over my psyche and through my heart. I thought I was drowning, honestly. I couldn’t breathe. I had no orientation. Everything was spinning around. My heart and lungs felt like they were literally on fire.

The thing is, I wasn’t even thinking anything in particular. I wasn’t fondly caressing a poignant memory or replaying The Night of Horror in my mind. I was blithely doing something mundane and a wave of grief rose up and up and up. It pulled all the hardest pain up with it. The kind that any smart person would run away from. It pulled it up out of the deepest part of this broken heart and then... It. Crashed. Down.

I left as quickly as it came. It just rolled away and left me sputtering. I didn’t trust my legs for a bit. They had a newborn foal feel to them that had me convinced I would end up on the floor and rather ungracefully, at that.  On the inside I was shell shocked and bewildered; all the little cubby holes of where I’ve been gathering collections of memories and was keeping track of day-to-day schedules and other random things were thrown into a wild, jumbled pile. Grief, apparently, is not a fan of order. Like a marauding horde, it overtook, ransacked and looted my tiny vessel of sanity. What the fuck?

There was no warning of the tsunami ambush. I was doing nothing in particular that would bring it on. It just rose up from deep inside and wiped everything out. And like a real ocean tsunami, it was presaged by a recession of the waters, an invitation to go deeper and not be afraid. They say that’s why tsunami’s are so deadly because people run out deep into the receding water line never guessing that it is just the water drawing back for a knockout blow.

Unlike real tsunamis, these waves of grief are not deadly. As terrifying as they are, I can see how they help me heal. Leaning into the pain and staying open to the love is so important. Any sane person would want to curl up in a ball and hide from this shit. If the dentist asked you if you’d like to have your teeth drilled without novocaine you’d run like hell, right? These waves are painfully purposeful; pulling up pieces of my heart that I might want to hide, to protect, from the agony of this new story. The one that is going on without you here. To be healed and to be whole, I lean in and let the waves find the pieces of my heart and bring them to the surface. Once here, in the open, I can reveal and release that agony and then, gradually, let the gentle sun shine upon them.

One piece at a time, the Crystal Heart that was shattered will once again be whole. It will shine again with the warm sun and even more vibrantly and with even more dancing rainbows.

I know a few more things today than I did. I know that grieving your loss, Thor, is an epic journey like The Fellowship of the Ring. I have all I need to embark on this path; a map (One Love), a destination (One Love), some guides (You and all the angels), some allies (our family and friends who are showering us with love and prayers) and vast resources (Inner Strength and Fortitude). Most of all I will keep Faith and Love with me at all times to fearlessly meet the unforeseen obstacles, pitfalls and scary-ass ambushes that await me on this journey.

I love you, Thor.

Mom