Wednesday, July 12, 2017

6.

It's a sad feeling when the ache of missing you feels closer than the memories of you. I feel like I have stared at your face for a lifetime and have intimately known the curves of your features and the light of your eyes, but it now can seem so foreign. 
I watched videos of you last weekend and I somehow had forgotten how antsy/crazy/ACTIVE you were. And how Jacob-even as an infant-lit up and was so joyful around you. This "anniversary" I am finding myself more focused on Jacob and the relationship he had/has with you. This past year little comments have been dotted throughout. Jake wanting to build a time machine to save you. Jake commenting that he is the oldest now-here, not in Heaven. Jake recognizing his new role established 6 years ago. Jake missing you. Feeling the solidness in his shoulders and hands and how tall he has grown. Feeling this boy grow while you can't age. (Atleast in the normal sense of aging) Worrying on how he is growing and changing and where your memory to him fits in all of it. Praying he can always speak so freely about you-even when his memories soften around the edges. Hoping he cherishes life in a way he may not have before and will always think of you by his side. You are still the big brother no matter what. 
***
Rachel made some reflective comments to me when I was lamenting on each of the kids, and finally vocalizing the hard time I have with Andrew and understanding him.
Jake and I share a tragedy. Even before, Jacob has felt different in my mother heart. Now, having shared something so encompassing, we're bonded in an even deeper way. She mentioned Emma is my last and was given after such a hard event. Her very presence everyday is like a promise. Lately, I have wondered if bottled in Andrew is the same energy that Daniel possessed. Really, what else can explain the explosive nature of that kid? Those two, Daniel and Andrew, so bent on their own way, their own thoughts and time line. I wonder if I would be having the same impatience and puzzlement as I commonly feel with Andrew if the two were together? I wonder if Andrew is missing the person that resembles him best-and not really even knowing what he is missing- and how that will play in his shaping as he grows?
6 years later the raw of the hurt and the wounds of the grief has changed it's appearance. It doesn't feel as singular as it once did. It feels like it's grabbing for them now. I want to think I can rise to these new challenges but as each new encounter arrives, I feel an edge. A second guessing to what I have said or have not said. Am I doing it "right" in walking this uncharted path? Am I doing too much or too little? 
I am working this year. Jacob has his last baseball game on the 19th and Ryan works and I need to save PTO for the special trip Ryan and I are taking. It seems counterproductive to use PTO to take away from the living moments that are occurring presently. But, who knows? Here is another first and I just don't know what to expect. 
Pray for grace for me that day. And kind patients. And control when control needs to occur. And to embrace the life that were are currently experiencing. And a good game for Jake as I don't know if I could handle his upset that day. 
It's weird this year. I feel like I am on the verge of something. The feeling is almost like the tension felt in a ill fitting shirt; tight and awkward, but if removed, comfortable. I just don't quite know what the discomfort is. I just pray whatever it is, I continue to overcome. 

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