Closure

I can still hear my sister’s voice over the phone, Momma’s gone, baby.  I can still feel that rush of emotion. One part of me happy that it was finally over and she could rest in peace. The other part of me distraught at the knowledge that the person at the center of my life had passed.

It’s been better than a year and a half since that day. More than a year and a half since I began this journey that I never would have imagined the level of difficulty. Not quite a month has passed since my sister and I took our trip back to our hometown intent on tying up some loose ends and, hopefully, finding some closure.

I can still feel that empty feeling of exasperation, like a man realizing a mirage in the dessert, when we got out of my car and approached my mother’s grave site.  Befuddled we stood there for several minutes until my sister pulled out some notes and compared them to a cemetery land marker nearby.  As we figured out the approximate area of where her grave was I kept thinking how wrong it was that we were there doing that.  I couldn’t shake the feeling until I breathed a slight prayer for strength.

Then I muttered to my sister that we ought to head off to the store and pick out some more flowers.  Normally she and I have fun when we go to the store together, but this time the mood was more somber.  We found a few items that satisfied our needs, purchased them and headed back to the cemetery where we placed the new tribute at the head of Momma’s grave.  On the drive back to my dad?s house we managed to find things to laugh about, but I was discontent.

I spent that evening in the basement first napping and then connecting with friends and associates at the Mayhem while my sister watched an old movie with my Dad upstairs.  The plan for tomorrow was to spend the first part of the day clearing the junk out of the storage room and hoping for a last chance sale of what we had to sell before journeying back down south.  I was anything, but satisfied with the idea and it was mine.  We had spent all that time and money and still were no closer to emptying out that storage room and getting a gravestone on my mother’s grave.  I felt like such a failure.

Then somebody from the Mayhem suggested a homemade gravestone.  My emotions lit up and when my sister came downstairs shortly for bed I told her of the idea.  Then I went to bed prayerfully excited.

First thing in the morning my sister verified that we could indeed put out our own temporary gravestone.  Then we got ourselves together and headed out for the day with a new plan in place.  By then end of the day my sister had created our own gravestone for my mother’s grave.  Although I was stressed with financial matters I spent the evening just praising God.

The next morning we drove out to the cemetery and put out the gravestone.  I had come prepared to dig out a spot and set it in the ground myself, but the wonderfully nice lady managing the cemetery said that she had workers coming out that following Monday to lay other gravestones and it was no problem to have them do ours, too.  I was nearly in tears.

Later that afternoon we headed back home with a sense of closure.  I’ve been so upset that of all the things I couldn’t do when we buried my mother’s body we didn?t have a marker for her grave.  Now she had one designed and created by her two artistically gifted children. I can?t think of a better headstone.

We hope to soon be able to place a professionally done gravestone on my mother’s grave, but even when that’s done our specially made one will still be there as they will then move it to the foot of her grave. Praise God. This will be even better.

Momma’s been at peace for a year and a half.  Now I’m a huge step closer to being a peace about the way it ended, too.

Placing that gravestone was extremely important for me.  I’m not going to lie and say that I?m totally at peace, now. Not being able to give my mother a proper funeral took a major toll on me.  Not being able to carry my family’s load during our transition to life without my mother still weighs too much on me.  I’m working hard to get through this.  I’m getting there.

Tomorrow I go back to work.  I’m more balanced, now and I feel that I should be able to better hold up against the demands of the daily work grind.  God’s miracles were present when we put down that gravestone.  There’s no reason why they won’t continue.

Peace, love & funkiness

K

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