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The past six days I spent at one of my son’s homes. The time together was priceless and I wasn’t ready to leave. I’m never ready to leave either of my sons. Even when times are good.
As I was packing to leave, my son had already left for work and my ability to hug him one more time had passed. I picked up a stuffed animal that had belonged to him as a child. A striped orange cat with camouflage shorts. The rest of his outfit was lost years ago. I held the cat to my face and inhaled deeply, as if I could smell my son as a child again through the animal. I tucked him under my arm and carried him down the stairs with my pillow. I just couldn’t put him back down. I needed him. A connection that spanned who my son was then and who he is today.
A link from when he lived with me as a small child to stretch across the miles between us now.
The drive from his house to mine is roughly two and a half hours and I generally cry at least part of the way. I can’t stop the tears. It is hard to say goodbye when I know that I have already lived through a “last one” and we aren’t guaranteed another with any of our children.
When I got home I was exhausted. Emotionally. Physically. Mentally. My face was puffy and my nose was stuffed. I cried longer than usual. I wanted to take a nap right away. I tried. My mind wouldn’t stop circling. I tried to paint. I couldn’t get anything to look the way I wanted. I finally turned on the tv for background noise and cleaned up. Did laundry. Trying to stay busy until bedtime. The house was quiet in a way that wasn’t peaceful, but empty.
Bedtime finally arrived and my mind was able to slow down and allow me to sleep. I slept deeply and for a long time. I would like to say I awoke rested but in truth I didn’t. I woke up less physically tired, though.
The sun was bright as I sat down on the couch with a cup of coffee in my favorite mug. The animals arranged themselves around me as they usually do. I felt a bit lost and wasn’t sure how to fill the day. Next to me, on the table, was a little notebook I was using to plan a new garden. I picked it up and let my eyes wander over the plans I’d been making the week before. A list of plants I wanted to add to the area. Another list of plants and seeds I already had – given to me by friends. A third page held the names of people who offered me flowers and small trees if I wanted to come dig them up. Then, I remembered it was Saturday and the farmer’s market was open.
My friend and I decided to go down to the market. What a perfect place to wander for a while. The entire side yard is a blank canvas so there is a large area to fill. There are a number of songbirds who come to the feeder so I knew I wanted to build the garden around the wildlife that visits daily, and nightly. Birds, rabbits, turkeys, possums, a skunk, and last year we had two adolescent raccoons who stopped by at dusk for nearly a week. I don’t have a preference about who eats at the feeder. Any hungry animal is welcome to partake.
There are also a handful of domestic animals, stray cats in particular, who seem to come to our house in order to feed. There is one big old scruffy gray tom cat who I see once in a while. His left ear is tipped so I know he has been fixed. I love catching a glimpse of him now and then even though I can tell he wants nothing to do with me. That’s ok. I just want him fed.
Part of the garden, the area in the back protected on three sides, is going to be a semi-permanent area for the strays in the neighborhood. A handful of insulated houses. Fresh food and water. Safety.
There was a booth at the market that had little plants for sale. One of the plants had the most beautiful green leaves. Their shape pleased me immediately. I asked about them and learned they are nasturtiums. The woman at the booth said she had two kinds. Orange and red, and just red. The flowers are edible. I bought four. Two of each color. Then I saw catnip. I had planned on getting a few plants to put in the cat shelter area so I got one plant for them and one for the two cats who live in our house, Walter and Avi. In a box next to the catnip were bulbs. A sign on the front of the box said “Tulip bulbs – fill a bag for $1”. We filled two bags and brought home roughly forty bulbs. I have no idea what colors they are but I am looking forward to finding out when they bloom next year.
Later in the day we went to a garden center and my friend purchased six fruit trees. We hadn’t planned to but I am so happy we did. Two apple, two pear, and two peach. Years are going to pass before we get fruit, I imagine, but that’s alright. They felt perfect for the pollinator section of the garden. It is easy to imagine them bursting with blooms. By next year, I hope, the branches may be able to hold the weight of a nest. In five years, fruit will fall to the ground and feed an animal. In ten years there will be shade enough to cool the yard.
A few hours after getting home from the garden center I remembered I hadn’t finished the laundry yesterday. I got off the couch, looked out the window at the fruit trees lining the fence across from the bird feeders, then went down to the basement.
Moving clothes from the washer to the dryer, I suddenly heard a loud buzzing very near my head. I looked up at the small window and saw movement. I realized there was a bumblebee that was trying desperately to get outside. She (they are all shes to me) kept hitting the glass. Her body was dirty with cobwebs. I couldn’t figure out how she had gotten down there but I knew I had to get her outside.
I ran upstairs and grabbed a cup and a piece of paper and was able to catch her easily. She was right where I’d left her. She wasn’t going to leave that window with the sunshine falling through.
She was on the wrong side of outside.
I got her outside, removed the paper from the mouth of the cup, and gently shook her onto a flowering bush. She didn’t land, though. She dropped a bit then took flight. I watched her fuzzy bottom zig-zagging across the front yard.
As I watched her disappear, I understood something familiar in her earlier desperation: my grief did not remove me from the world entirely. It placed me beside it. Life remained visible. I just could not always reach it.
Bereaved parents live life adjacent.
I walked toward the new trees again imagining future blossoms, feeling the cool shade to come. There was a small chickadee perched on the delicate branch of one of the apple trees as it gently swayed in the breeze.
I picked up the gardening notebook when I went inside. I wanted to add the plants that came home with us today. The inventory of what we have is growing longer. This isn’t just a list of what we physically have. If I read between the lines it is also a list of what remains. What is possible. What is alive. What can still be tended.
What brings me back into life.
Words Can Express 