I can make out sounds before I know that I am listening. I slowly become aware before I remember who I am, or even that I am. I am devoid of feeling, until I am not.
Then it comes rushing in.
My heart begins to pound. My tummy flutters. I have anticipation, or perhaps it is dread. There is a slight delay here, before the details become unblurred, where I can hover in the beauty of the yet to be figured out.
Then things become clear.
In the days after Molly died this was my most difficult part of the day. Not the unclear moment, that was ok, it was the millisecond that preceded all things remembered. I would jump up from the floor upon which I slept and scurry to the kitchen. I would make a coffee and go sit on the porch. I would scroll my phone.
It can happen the other way too.
Remembering brings joy, (Santa came!!). Or excitement, (The Kiwanis Fair is today!). Or relief, (I got the job!). As a child I had equally mixed experiences with this part of the day. I am still not good at lying in bed once I wake up.
Being alone in my head has never been comfortable for me.
I am also not the greatest with change. Well, let me clarify, the anticipation of change, and those first few moments of it. Let me paint a picture for you.
As third grade drew to a close, my classmates and I all chattered on incessantly about 4th grade and our soon to happen transfer to Kimball School. New friends, a new building, a bigger playground. We were all excited. I was too!
Until I wasn’t.
What if I don’t like it? When will I see all my old teachers? I will never be a Dewey School Student ever again! Oh no. I will never be a third grader again! These thoughts overwhelmed me and as I said goodbye to Mrs. Day and walked home the tears began to flow. I cried for three days.
I ached for something that could never return. Me as a third grader. There was no do over, no return to a happy time, no more third grade, ever. Molly went through this exact experience at the end of her second grade year. She was inconsolable, for about three days.
Watching her go through this brought it all back for me.
Writing this brings it all back for me again. And I want so much to actually have it back. I want to go back to 1972 and end third grade again. I want to re-live a hundred times over every decision I made that led to Molly’s death. I want to go back to her finishing second grade again, I want her back. I want it all back.
I want this so badly it hurts.
I miss her. I miss how I felt when she was alive. I miss everything I thought would happen when she was alive. All of the things she was supposed to do. I might miss that the most.
But how can that be? How can you miss something you never had?
This question, and it’s complete lack of an answer is a long lasting effect of my grief over Molly’s death. I ache for all the tangibles, obviously. Her smell, her voice, her shoulder dimples. But I ache just as much for the intangibles, her 8th grade semi-formal, her high school graduation, her 21st birthday.
“Hiraeth”
A spiritual longing. Nostalgia. The echo of lost places. For that which perhaps never was, and that which can never be recovered, or experienced again. It is nowhere and everywhere.
“Molly.”
Her actual elbows and her elusive 21st birthday. Her first day of school and her high school graduation. All of her and none of her all the time. I am homesick for her in a way that cannot be accurately described with words. It is strong at times and hardly noticeable at others, but it is always there. Always whispering to me. Like those milliseconds in the morning before I am awake, my emotions in a constant vigil waiting for something I will never have.
Hiraeth.
I love that there is a word for this. It must be an actual thing, then. A real feeling experienced by people worldwide, through all of time. That immeasurable ache for something that once was and will never quite be.
Molly.
My 26 days in Bali gave me a bit of locational hiraeth. Molly has never been to Bali with me, so, there were no reminders of events and experiences we had together. Yes, I missed her. I always miss her. But she wasn’t missing from that place. My return home has been a barrage of locational memories and item driven sadness.
She is everywhere. She is nowhere.
Much like third grade, my physical time with her is over. I know, I know, it has been over for almost nine years. I get it. But it was just yesterday. It was a million years ago, Maybe, it never happened. Time and light and knowledge and music and thoughts are all different now and not quite where they were prior to May 1st, 2016.
Hiraeth.
There is something comforting about labels and identifications. They create belonging and inclusion. When I share my feelings with other grieving mothers, I am a part of a group. We get each other. We understand. We would all trade this connection to have our children back. We also love each other fiercely.
I will experience hiraeth daily for the rest of my life.
I can now give it a name. I can talk to it and address it.
Hiraeth.