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You’re Not Bothering Me
“I don’t want to bother you….” starts the email. It’s nothing new. I get an email or a text or something like this at least a couple of times a day. At first, when Shawn was sick and then immediately after he died, I couldn’t really process anything. I read the emails and then never responded and I figured people understood. If I’m being honest, I didn’t even care. I appreciated the outreach in the immediate aftermath, but (and I’m sorry here for everyone who helped me) I honestly can’t really remember who did what. I was in such a fog. I’m not totally out of that fog yet, but…
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An Uncomfortable Reality
A few days ago I was waiting to pick up Claire from school, baking under the newly hot weather we’re getting these days. I was standing around with all of the other parents and babysitters and somehow ended up next to an acquaintance I hadn’t seen in awhile. “Oh, Marjorie,” she said to me, “I haven’t seen you since….everything happened. How are you doing?” I didn’t quite know how to respond. Was I not supposed to talk about Shawn’s death since she couldn’t bring herself to mention it? I had always liked this woman, and though we weren’t close, her kids had been in class with mine. And yet she…
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Press Fast-Forward
“You know what I wish right now?” I asked my friend Christine. I was drinking a beer with her on a beautiful day, watching our children play in an idyllic setting. “What?” she asked. “I wish I could press fast forward on my life,” I told her. I meant it. I’ve never felt this way. Even when things were hard throughout my life, like when I was teaching in a really difficult school or homesick in a foreign country, I still loved my life as a whole. It’s one of the things I think people like about me. I’m over-the-top positive, so much so that people will say things like,…
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Why I Can’t Call You Back
I have at least a dozen unanswered voicemails on my phone. That might not seem like a lot, but I just deleted all of my voicemails a few days ago. Sure, there’s one from the dentist and another from the cemetery (there’s a phrase I never thought I’d write) but most of the voicemails are from friends and family. I recently got a new phone that actually transcribes my voicemails. It’s great. I can tap on the voicemail and see basically what someone said on the phone. I use this feature all the time, and then if I’m feeling especially grateful for the love, or guilty about not being in…
There’s No Handbook for How to Do This
