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Nights at the Kitchen Counter
When Shawn was alive, we reconnected most nights in the kitchen after the kids went to sleep. They were all so young back then, and went to bed by 8 pm, always. We treasured the few hours together that we got without them. (Oh how he would hate Claire’s new bedtime of 9 pm!) Anyway, each night we’d both come down to the kitchen, and usually he’d re-heat food I made earlier in the evening or put something else in the oven. I’d sit at the counter and we’d talk about our days. I often had some drama from school (the staff meeting went way too long, or some student…
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Wisps of a Dream
I was walking through a cave, and I felt like it was somewhere I’d been before. Other people (tourists, maybe?) were standing and talking softly on the edges of my vision. The cave was cool, but I could hear a dull roar in the distance. Shawn was next to me. I knew this shouldn’t be true – I knew he was dead – but there he was, standing upright with a slight smile on his face. He didn’t talk much, but then again, Shawn could always be a bit quiet when he was exploring a new space. We walked through the cave. It smelled of salt, and there was a…
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I Am Someone New, Too
My sister had a baby last month. I was abroad when it happened, and I spent hundreds of dollars that day on my phone bill. I could hear the thrill of new parenthood in her voice, even just a few hours after she became a mom. I went to visit her a few weeks later. The second I saw her, I felt like I was going to start crying. There she was, holding her baby in a sling on her chest. The baby was sleeping. And my sister was beaming. In that moment, I could see it. My sister was the person she’d always been: thoughtful, and with a great…
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What Austin Brought to Camp
On Saturday, I helped Austin pack for camp. We went through the extensive list of things he needed, and near the end, I pointed to his toiletry bag. “Austin, you have a toothbrush, toothpaste and some soap,” I said. “What else do you think you’ll need for the bathroom?” Austin looked at the bag and then at his body. “Nothing,” he said, and shrugged. “Actually, I probably won’t even use most of the soap.” I laughed, though he wasn’t trying to make a joke. He is really low-maintenance. It’s one of the many ways that Austin is just like his dad. (Once, about 6 or 7 years ago, Shawn went…
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Questions
There were so many questions after Shawn died. So many. Was there a family history of cancer? Did he exercise? What were the warning signs? Why didn’t you demand a colonoscopy earlier? Did he have a regular doctor? Did he smoke? Did the medical team try immunotherapy? Did he eat a special diet? Did he drink a lot? Did he have symptoms earlier in the year? Was he healthy otherwise? Those were just some of the things people asked me. Of course there were questions. Shawn was an incredibly vibrant 40-year-old. How could this happen, they wondered? But the big question was lurking under all of these questions, one that…
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Our Bathroom
Claire and I share a bathroom. It wasn’t always this way, of course. Once upon a time, Claire used the bathroom by her room, the one Shawn and I designated for the kids after we remodeled the house a few years ago. But when Shawn died and my dad moved in, all of the sudden there were four people using the kids’ bathroom and just me using the master bathroom. “I should share this bathroom with you,” Claire said one day. She had just turned 9. “It can be the girls bathroom. The boys can all use the bathroom in the hallway.” I wavered a bit, but somehow just a…
There’s No Handbook for How to Do This
