I have empathy for the quiet and awkward woman who carried and birthed me. It wasn’t always that way, but I understand more now. Forty weeks wasn’t enough, but it was all that we had. In losing her I learned to grieve in guilty silence the loss of something I never had. I’m an expert now. Twenty-five
Yesterday, we drove the same highway we took two decades ago enroute to our honeymoon destination in Victoria, BC. We were on the way to somewhere different this time, somewhere we think we might have been before—maybe even on our way home from our honeymoon—but we’re not certain. After two decades, our memories are soft
When she arrived, nearly two weeks ago, it was still winter. The melt had just started in earnest, but the backyard—the north-facing yard—was still white. On that first day, I predicted that the snow would all be gone by the time she went home. ”Don’t talk about me going home,” she said. No, I suppose
”Stinker! She’s not even going to turn around,” my daughter, Laurinda says. We’re standing on what must be the sidewalk in front of her new home—the one we’ve spent the weekend helping her settle in to—but is now buried under some of the largest snowbanks I’ve seen in recent memory. The morning air is cold;
I see her when we are having supper. She looks to be about eleven-years-old. Her long blonde hair falls free, it is neatly brushed, and she is wearing a one-piece green jumpsuit. She is watching the cook clean the grill and pour batter—patiently waiting for fresh waffles. Her eyes are big and observant in the
Later, I’m sitting in a chair holding my newborn granddaughter, who has been given the name Makiya Rose, while the nurses fuss around tending to her mom. My heart is so full it aches as I hold the perfect baby girl in my arms, stroke her soft little hands, drink in the features of her
“I have one sister left,” Aunt Katie said in her first letter to me. “We are the only two who have made it beyond our sixtieth birthday. My mother, father, and brother all passed away before they reached sixty. My mother was forty-seven. All had heart problems.” She doesn’t mention her other sister—my birth mom—who died