Midwest. Motherhood. Marriage. Martinis. | Shelter from the storm

Shelter from the storm

Posted on July 10, 2008
Filed Under guest posts |

This incredibly touching post is from a dear blog friend on the anniversary of her mother’s death. She wishes to remain anonymous.

“What do you mean you don’t believe in God?!”

My mother was angry.  Very angry.  I was 17  years old and being a smart ass, arguing about an existence of a god with her. 

“I don’t see how anyone could have your stead fast faith without proof,” I began to tell my mom, “because there is no real proof that there is a god!  Look at everything that is wrong in the world today…”

It was 1995.  People were starving, little villages were being destroyed, the bombing in Okalahoma had killed so many innocent people, especially the children… I couldn’t fathom a god.  My mother looked at me hurt.  Her blue eyes were remorseful.  “I am sorry you feel that way.  Maybe,” she said, “as you get older you will find God again, or at least your angels.”

It’s ironic the first time I remembered that conversation. It took place when we were in the kitchen in our little house in the bay area.  It was 105 degrees out and our AC wasn’t working.  I was really just trying to get a rise out of her that day.  I quickly forgot about the conversation, but it came screaming back into my consciousness, so real, so vivid, while I was sitting in the second pew of the church a few years later in the 105 degree heat, leaning on my brother’s shoulder for support.  After all, I never expected to be at my mother’s funeral when I was barely twenty.

God. God. Religion. Faith. Heaven. Hell.  Everything in between.  If, as a baptized catholic, I had questions when I was 17 and was doubting the existence, I sure as hell gave up faith now.  No one should feel this way, deal with these pains, not when they are 20.  Hell, not when they are 50, 60, 70 or even 270!  But here I was, sitting in that pew, cursing god, turning my back, and crying with my siblings.

The next few years I spent in college studying religion, or “different cults” as I liked to put it.  I found it interesting that all the religions in the world seemed to all have similarities that could be traced back many millenniums.  The more I studied, I had hoped, the better I would understand the concept of why God took away my mom. Or maybe I could find God again, or at least find faith.

When I was in college, I met a boy.  Technically, I met him just shy of two years after her death.  He was sexy, funny, and kind.  I fell in love for him, despite my family not liking him, despite my friends pointing out he could be really cruel to me.  We were married in a non-denominational ceremony.  (Despite his cheating and porn addictions)

A few years later, I gave birth to a baby.  Not an easy delivery.  Not an easy labor.  And 9 months later, after my husband was in another affair with the nanny this time, putting us further into debt by buying his failing business, and saying he wanted to have a “swinging” relationship, I took the baby and left.

When I left, I had a job that paid me 1500 a month.  I had no car.  No place to live.  I didn’t know what to do.  All I did know was I was relieved.  Let him ruin all my friendships with his lies.  Let him try to drag me down to make himself feel better about what he is.  I have our son, and that’s what is important to me.

Within a week, I had found a place I could afford for my son and me.  My friends from high school, who I hadn’t seen in 10 years, took me in until I could move.  I got a newer, higher paying job.  I bought a car that I could afford. I found a day care near my work  that would charge me a discounted rate because I was a single parent and they understood my situation of having no child support. I found stability.

I couldn’t believe my run of luck.  And it was lucky.  Almost  too lucky.  My first day at work, I looked down from my new office across the street.  My heart stopped.  I ran down to the street on my break and walked, incredulously, up to the bar that was in my eye line from my office.  It was an Irish pub, a little worse for wear. 

It was also the pub my mom met my dad at.

A few days later I was talking to one of my mom’s college friends at a family reunion.  We were talking about where we lived in SF.  It turns out that in the reminiscing Jan told me that when my mom first moved to SF from NY in 1965, she lived on sloat blvd.  something about the address seemed so familiar to me.  The following week I was picking my son up from daycare when I realized why it was familiar.

The daycare was run out of the house my mother lived in when she came to SF.

Recently, I was going to bed and thinking how things would be different if my mother hadn’t died.  Would I be living with her and my son?  Would I have the room in the second floor?  My old room?  Would my son love living with grandma?  And of course, the anger boils over in my head, “screw you for dying!!!  You aren’t here when I need you!”

But then I realize, isn’t she here?

The job…

The house…

The car….

The friends…

The daycare…

Smooth as velvet, her voice comes into my head, “still don’t believe in god?”

I went to sleep.

Next day, I was visiting one of my patients.  She was dying.  She looked at me and smiled.  “Christina,” she said smiling, “it’s been awhile.”  Ironically, this woman I discovered a while ago, had worked with my mom when she was my age.  I am the spitting image of her. “no, It’s Siobhan,” I said, “My mom died about ten years ago.”

“I’m dying now aren’t I?” she asked me.

“yes.”

“Ok, well I expect heaven will be nice.  Is it nice Christina?”

Confusion is normal at this stage when you are dying.  I smiled and reminded her that I wasn’t Christina but, “tell her hi and I miss her.”

My patient looked confused.  “tell her yourself, she’s standing right behind you.  She is wearing a beautiful necklace with her kids names on it.”

I froze.  My siblings and I bought that necklace for her to be buried in. NO ONE KNEW ABOUT IT EXCEPT US.

Believe in God? Faith restored.  Believe in Angels?  Always.

Today is the tenth year anniversary.  I miss you mom.  I miss you so very much.  However, I have the feeling you are never too far away from me. 

And that is my shelter in this storm.

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