Letters to Tuvia: Digging in the Past(7-17-16)

Morning T,

I Found this in my FB memories/Blog archives- one of my letters to Eileen July 17,2012 that I just adapted for you…

I am up and my apartment is humming. Windows are open and my sad planters, filled with dead remnants of this crazy July heat wave are gone way too soon. I do have some survivors and they are now soaked with life and trimmed down.

And so begins the next chapter of my life without the early morning calls to my mom. Actually the calls home continue but now when my dad answers the phone it’s quiet in his house and he isn’t passing to phone off to my mom. He won’t be doing that ever again.

It’s been strange. It was a whirlwind of two weeks from the time my mom took her last fall, was raced to the hospital, went through an operation on her hip and spent the next week fading away from us. One week of visits to the new hospital near Middletown, sitting and watching her decline, my dad helpless and you by my side, suffering along with us.

And the whirlwind continued through the funeral, the Shiva period, the race to arrange the trip to Israel for Maya’s wedding, pack and get on a plane just two weeks after her decline had officially begun. It was fast and I was strangely disconnected, just trying to keep it all straight, just the little things, like worrying about packing time, even though when it came time to fill the suitcases, I had no problem.

And the week in Israel with my family and the events leading up the wedding, time with Israeli friends and family from your side and of course the wedding event and it all felt… strange, for lack of a better word. I watched my dad feeling torn between joy and deep sadness. He was treated with great respect but it was hard for him to take it all in, digest it because someone was missing.

It’s the little, life things that hit you the hardest.

A week away from you but I shared it all regularly.

And today, here on a Sunday morning I’ve been up since 4:15 beginning as I’ve been doing for months, putting the bed back together, slowly, methodically, breathing in the day, and given that tomorrow is the first day of our Open getting out of here will be hectic so I’ve changed the bedding…

Always as I move through this life- anchoring activity my morning tears appear in the process and I will never wipe them away because they are a gift from you. They move with me as I open the home to a fresh, new day. I walk the space with you opening doors, windows, moving cushions and pillows out to the porch. It always feels good to start again, hoping that the end of the day will feel as good. Usually I just feel exhausted and empty in the silence. Maybe that will change. For now I have the mornings to look forward to.

This morning after a bit of TV weather and news I was determined to begin with a work focus, preparing for our first session tomorrow, ready to finalize the day with Kristen when she’s up and ready. I’ve been procrastinating and torturing myself about it, worried that I will never get focused again, much like a writer might feel before ideas start to flow. But with enough sleep and a deadline now looming , I shut the TV, moved to the porch with coffee #1 and got at it with the help of my HVWP files from the past and our new inspirational text The Journey is Everything from Katherine Bomer. What a title, don’t you think? Could have been our mantra. My mantra now? The journey is everything… something to write about tomorrow????

Ready for Kristen, ready for a day in NYC with the Rosenbergs. I’m sure you would have loved seeing Leora’s new aparment.

Damn, I miss spending my life with you…