Words that Change Things

I find myself listening and looking for words that can change things.  Little things.  Big things.  Lots of things.  Anything. 

I listen while waiting in line for a morning or late afternoon coffee; while paying for groceries; while searching through aisles of books.  I listen to the workaday-world conversations of baristas, of cashiers.  I read phrases in books, excerpts in magazines, and I avoid newspapers. 

I find little, if anything, moving in a direction of change in a progressive, positive fashion -  whether little, big, or any change.  I can’t help but wonder if this a function of my world view, or the world view.  I’m fairly certain outside observers convince themselves it’s just because “her kid died, and no one knows for sure, what happened.”  From here, from inside this story, I can assure you, we see something happening out there, that is not necessarily connected only to our circumstances.  Whatever happened to take Owen from us, is rare, but not a solitary event.  Others know, too, that the world is empty of answers for many of our young folks.  What did we have that brought us this far, that is now so obviously lacking, for them? 

On those rare occasions when I do find something that makes me smile or laugh, I cherish that thought throughout my day.  I hold it close, like a child in my arms, too tender to loosen my grip, lest it run into oncoming traffic. “Car coming.” 

Is it the habit of loss, to look back, to remember, to long for the old days?  Well, yes, we want it all back.  Being thinking and feeling people, we know we can’t go back.  We look forward, and ask what’s out there that will make it all better? 

Where is the kiss on the scraped knee, the band-aid and cookie, the promise that “it will feel better when it quits hurting”?  My dad used to say that, when we were little.  Then, after he died, Mom took up the phrase, and I heard it throughout my childhood.  It will feel better when it quits hurting.  I want her to tell me this now.  Neither she, nor my dad can hold me and say these words, nor allow me to hope like any parent, that it’s true – redundancy aside.

I can’t predict when it will quit hurting.  I don’t actually believe that time will come.  I believe it may soften, for this has been my experience in losing other family and friends.  But, it’s different losing my son.  There will always be those moments when Owen’s face, or something he said, or the sound of his footsteps, or his shy laughter, will ring in my heart, and I will succumb to the moment I heard these words: Your son’s body was found at approximately 1:20 p.m. today, in the Petaluma River.  I know I will bend in half in the pain of his loss, right back there on that Saturday afternoon, after searching for him for four days, watching my foot kicking the cedar chest on which it rested.  There is nothing like it.  Nothing that can soften that posture, the kicking, the screaming.  Nothing that can bring the police officers’ faces into focus.  I don’t want to see them clearly.  I don’t want to hear those words again.  Yet, they are there at all hours…your son’s body was found… 

I move through my days with something I call “survival routine” - barely more.  When I force myself to do something out of the ordinary, like I did this weekend, I find “life” out there among you all.  I hear your jokes, I hear your plans, I hear your advice. 

I find your lives moving forward.  And, I find my life standing in stark contrast, and I know this is so, when you ask me what I’m writing.  How? 

Because, when I tell you what I’m writing, your eyes well up in tears.  You lean back in your chairs, and place your hands flat on tables, fingers spread out in the hope that gravity will keep you attached to your comfortable places in those expensive hotel chairs.  You take deep breaths.  You go silent…when words have always saved you in uncomfortable situations.  Some of you bend forward in rehearsal, knowing that the bent-in-half posture is where your body would take you, if this story belonged to you.  What would it be like to lose my kid?  I can’t imagine.  I don’t want to imagine.  Neither did I.  Neither did any of us who lost Owen.

Back there, back in the days of mornings filled with alarm clocks, cereal bowls, washing faces, and packing lunches, we knew little more than what time school was out, and which homework assignments belonged in which backpacks.  When we stopped to think, or talk about all the possibilities, sure, they were there, just off to the side, hopefully, not a part of our destinies.   

Owen’s last backpack was filled with many things, among them, his latest journal.  He wasn’t on his way to school.  He was on his way to the movies, a night off work.  What assignments did he give himself in those last few days, weeks?  Who’s reading his last words commited to pen and paper?  Surely, not a teacher.  Surely, a taker, a thief.

I saw beauty this weekend.  I walked by a young father holding his toddler crying in a stairwell.  The desperate father only wanted to comfort his baby, to make him feel better.  He rocked the little guy back and forth, loving away the boo-boo.  It will feel better when it quits hurting. 

Hearing the echo of that little kid’s voice, almost drove the stake too deep for me to take the next step.  I kept wondering if Owen screamed like that, just before he died.  Or, did he go silent, like some of the people I met this weekend – in rehearsal of his last breath?  Did he find no words could change things?  Little things?  Big things?  Anything? 

Song for the night:  Shine, Joni Mitchell

http://youtube.com/watch?v=wNflavqCmEc

~ by Linda on February 18, 2008.