This is not a sad post. I swear. Yes, last week, I wrote about how the body goes through a different grieving process than the mind and, in my case, that process was physically draining.
Yes, this Sunday will be three weeks since my Mom died. Of course, I will be grieving in a myriad of ways, both with big, gut wrenching feelings, and with flowing, small, day-to-day, flutters.
On flutters, last weekend, my sister sent me a photo of a butterfly that was sitting near where she and her family were hanging out on a beach. She said it had been hanging out for awhile, read, “Mom’s hanging out”. I apologize to my sister, if that’s not exactly what she meant, but that’s what the jist was to me, and, what many of us close to my Mom would think in that moment. That’s what we think about, when a very close loved one has just died. Their energy is still around.
Also, last week, I was walking back from the gym, with a friend and she said, “Oh, there’s a ladybug on you!” I glanced down and there was a ladybug parked on my black tank top, on the left side of my chest, yes, over my heart.
Now, I’ve had a soft-spot for ladybugs for awhile. I’m not the only one to see ladybugs as a sort of creature comfort in trying times. There have been many a time where I’ve noticed ladybugs hanging out around me in a way that did provide me comfort. I even have a toque I wear in winter (for last few years) that has an arty portrait of a lady bug. I’ve been considering getting a little ladybug tattoo, for awhile. Although, I haven’t fully decided if I will. Anyway, I dug that moment with the ladybug and my friend, who noticed, and knew what that moment would mean to me.
Back to energy. Another thing one might do, when one witnesses their mother’s body go from alive, to not alive, and, one shares the experience with others, and experiences the sensations that come with such deep transitions, is look up what happens to one’s energy when one dies. Does it make the dark TV vibrate for no reason? Where does your Mom’s soul GO exactly. In my searches, that first week, I found an article about the physics of energy and that it has to go somewhere. I shared the idea with my Facebook friends and that I found comfort in the idea that, “You can hope your family will examine the evidence and satisfy themselves that the science is sound and that they’ll be comforted to know your energy’s still around. According to the law of the conservation of energy, not a bit of you is gone; you’re just less orderly.“
So, is my Mom’s energy around in the form of a butterfly or in the form of a ladybug? Maybe?
BUT
And, this was my slightly wry reaction partway through this past week, “Who the f*ck cares?”. Neither the butterfly nor the ladybug are actually my Mom. I can’t hug either one. I can’t call them and tell them about my day at work, like I did, almost every day. When I went to call someone today, just dialling the Toronto area code, “416” prompted my phone to suggest my MOM’s number. Why not?! That’s who I would call, more often, than not.
If I am going to look for my Mom’s energy, now that her bodily form is gone, I will look for it in ways that make me smile. The friends who brought little key tchotchkes to make bracelets in honour of my Mom, because I have a meaningful tattoo with my Mom’s name in Hebrew, along with a drawing of a key, that has special significance to me.
I will look for my Mom’s energy, when I am reminding myself to be nice to someone, when I’m not in a “nice” mood.
I will look for my Mom’s energy, when I’m looking for strength to hold firm on a challenging call at work.
I will look for my Mom’s energy when I’m baking cookies or making soup or making many other dishes she loved – either to make or have me make for her.
I will look for my Mom’s energy in my sister’s no-nonsense way of taking care of what needs to be done with care for my Dad and other practicalities.
I will look for my Mom’s energy when my nephews are joking with one too many expletives and we all laugh at how my Mom would have joked that, that, was enough F bombs for one meal time.
I will look for my Mom’s energy when my husband and I smile knowingly at a memory we shared with my Mom in a thousand ways.
I will look for my Mom’s energy in all of the family and friends who continue to check in on me to see how I am – although I don’t always know how to respond – OK. Fine.
I will look for my Mom’s energy when I look for ways to find joy in each day, as she would have done, if she were still here.
This is not a sad post. I swear. My Mom left a happy legacy. Not a sad one. Also, she left way more than a ladybug, as sweet as they are.
