My firstborn son is 25 years old. He is almost half of my age.
When he was born, he was big. I mean... BIG. It was a surprise, just how big he was, but throughout his life, his personality has been just as big as the day he arrived, surprising all of us with his size, and he continues to surprise me still today with the way he continues to grow BIG into his own soul.
This isn't about his birth though. Or his growth. It isn't about his long curly hair or his almond shaped deep brown eyes, or his physique, or even his tattoo's. This is about his life... and mine... and life and death and all the stuff in between. It's about all my children.
Tonight I came home after work and ran an errand with my little son. We then came home and did our own separate activities: him on a google meet with friends, and me cleaning my ever-messy bedroom and prepping dinner and getting ready for tomorrow and another day of work/home/parenting/life. What did my firstborn son do? I dunno... he was probably also working. He works a lot - he works hard and works a lot of hours and works a lot of days: last count was 80 hours in one week. My boy, my son, Mijo, I'm proud AND worried....
While I cleaned my bedroom tonight: the room that is the depository for all the detritus of life in our small house; I turned on a movie to occupy my mind. It was one of those indie films full of all the feels, deep and dark and inspiring all at the same time. Maybe a little less inspiring and a lot more "feels"... with a whole lot of "dark/deep". It kept me occupied alright; it kept me sooooo occupied that my bedroom full of detritus did NOT get cleaned. At all...
Well, honestly, I did manage to move things from one spot to another, and then sort the spots into categories... but then somehow time was warped and I ended up piling it all back up into one big pile while the end of the movie played out musically in sharps and minors and half beats of time. I might have cried.
In the movie, the main character was a single mom who was mentally revisiting the suicide death of her adult son. In one soul wrenching moment of the movie she recalled seeing her dead son's toes curled tight in a spasm, and how she tried to straighten those toes, the toes that she'd grown inside her own body, the toes she'd kissed when he was a baby, the toes she'd tickled and covered up and protected and loved... and how those spasmed curled toes she could no longer kiss, tickle, cover, and protect.
I DEFINITELY cried.
A lot.
I have an adult son... and I also have 2 adult daughters... and another young son.
I fear for all of them, every day, and I fear for my own heart also, the fear of "the fear of losing them".
This movie had me praying, and cursing, and biting my tongue, and hoping, and praying even more. This movie had my stomach clenched, my jaw set hard, tears streaming down my face; and also had my soul set free and lifted up to the God I believe in and hold onto and take comfort in... and I prayed that my own children would hold the same belief I have - and be able to rest in the same comfort that I hold onto... or that they would find their own comfort and belief, even if it isn't' my own. We all need something outside ourselves to believe in and hold on to.
I have family members that have lost their own adult children, friends that have lost their own small children. I've lost my parents, and in-laws, and other family... I've lost friends that ARE family... I've lost friends that feel like my own children but yet... aren't. I know what it is to lose a parent, to lose a loved one, a life mate, to grieve for someone else's grief... in real time... but I have not lost my OWN child to their OWN demons, and God, oh God, I stay on my knees and pray that of all the losses I've had, and have yet to have, losing a child to their own demons is not a loss I have to face this time around.
Perhaps my turn will come, in this huge life, this karmaic adventure of love and experience; of surrender and battle all at once. Maybe in another life it has already happened and now I am making amends? I won't discount anything I don't know about.
Perhaps in THIS life tho, I will lose a child to demons I have no control over.
Perhaps its is a ridiculous farce to think my love will protect the children I have now in THIS life.
Are you laughing at me God?
I love you, all of you, my babies...but I know my love is not enough. I pray that you don't leave me yet. I still need your tiny (and not so tiny) kissable toes that I can uncurl and hold flat against this bumpy life...even if it's only in my heart. I still want time to uncurl you.
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