Weather Report

 

My mom died a year and a half ago and I still don’t know how to carry that loss. I’ve been wearing it like a coat, through all seasons, hiding in it and draping it over my shoulders as a cape, stuffing it in my purse and sleeping under it. This heartbreak is new, more fundamental than any other I have experienced; I’m not good at it. I can’t move through it — it’s always moving through me. There are no stages for grieving my mother, only weather:

 

Sun 

I’m fine, I’m living my life, I miss her but she taught me how to be in the world without her, I’m managing it …I wish she were here so she could see that I’m managing it.

 

 

Clouds

I miss her, I miss her, I miss her, I miss her, I miss her.

 

 

Wind

My head is down, I’m pointing myself where I want to go, but I can’t get there at a normal pace. It’s like running in deep water …exhausting.  I take shelter near something or someone solid if it gets to be too much.

 

 

Rain

I sit on the porch while the shower soaks into the grass and runs down the driveway. I let it drip through the trees and  flood the gutters. I try to be grateful for the drop in temperature and the colors deepening.

 

 

Thunderstorm

The power is out, I can’t sleep, the kids can’t sleep, we are all restless. We feel vulnerable no matter how solidly the house is built. I light candles and say, “we’re okay, we’re here together, there’s a kind of wild beauty in it, right?” But that’s easier to believe on a clear day.

 

 

Tornado

I hide in the basement, I hold the kids tight, I breathe and I wait.

 

 

Snow

Nature puts the world on mute and I go inside. The door is locked, but if someone knocks, I will let them in. From my window, I watch the snow erase everything familiar to me. Spring, when it comes, will draw me something new.

 

 

There are places in this world where predicting the weather is really easy — Minnesota is not one of them and Grief is not one of them. Here, where I am living, weather doesn’t follow any rules. Sometimes there’s snow in June. Sometimes there’s  a thunderstorm in February. This kind of grief has its own climate.