When You Realize That “Maybe Later” … May Be Now

It is hard to leave.

I think, though, that it’s harder to be left behind.

It was only a month ago.  I watched the tail lights until they were only a glimmer… and then gone.

I don’t know when I will see her again.  I didn’t cry.  Not one tear.  It’s pretty strange for me to hold back a good flood.  Cleansing… those tears.  Though I have to remind myself that there is no shame in them.  I wonder why we struggle so hard to fight tears, when releasing them is far beyond the relief that any long talk or soothing glass of wine can bring.  I have to remind my kids… especially my boys… there is no shame in crying.  We were made to cry just as much as we were made to laugh.

Nevertheless, the tears didn’t come.

Hm, strange.

My heart hurts… but, no tears.

Maybe later.

I looked into eyes… blue eyes, brown eyes, and those green ones.  Brimming heartache.  My own blue-green soul windows… guarded.  Heartache in my throat quickly smothered by my own words…

It’ll all be ok.

This will all work out.

Just wait and see.

This is only the beginning.

I repeated these same words over and over.  My kids needed to hear them, but maybe I needed to hear them the most.  I just didn’t know it yet.

I looked back as our own tail lights rounded the curve.  The tan mama arm thrown over her son’s shoulder.

I wonder if she is telling him the same thing…

We began the first leg of our journey.

Hours upon hours and then darkness set in.  Finally, through the veil of trees I could see the outline of the house I called home for decades.  This place of carefree youth nestled in the overgrowth of memories.  Snapshots tucked in my mind.  My parents still live there.  A gift.  The feeling in my throat returned… joy, sorrow… how odd the two can mix and swirl and just get stuck in your throat.  That ache that burns up to brimming lids.

Squeals from the back seats,

We’re finally here!

The words pushed that feeling and the brimming back into storage.  Maybe later.

Just a few days.  We had many more days to go.  A long journey for two parents, six kids, 1000 videos, and one truck.  We had a long way to go.  It would just leave time for a few short days here.

The thunderstorm woke her that night.  She doesn’t do very well with thunderstorms anymore.  She tells me that they remind her of the bombs.  The bombs that burned her German city when she was 13.  The apartment home her family lived in was hit directly.  The air raid sirens shrieked through the night.  My mom and her little 3-year-old brother were separated from her mother and three other siblings.  Running in all directions.  Running into a burning city.  For a while, she sat with him on a park bench.

You just can’t imagine the storms that come with that much fire.

So many storms.

They began to walk.  They walked and walked.  The door to the bunker was open.  The women standing at the doors wore only their slips.  The heat was too intense to remain dressed in proper clothing.  The women were fanning air into that bunker.  That’s where she found them.  That’s where mom found her own mama and siblings.  They were reunited.  A gift.

The storms, they scare me.

I looked into these eyes that had comforted, disciplined, loved, and raised me.  She was the one who calmed my young heart during the storms of my youth.  Now, she walked into the kitchen shadowed by midnight and needed a little bit of comfort right back.

It’s ok, Mom.

It can’t hurt you.

We’ll just talk a little while.

We talked for a while.  The memories slowly sifting from this mind that holds decades upon decades of life.  Those same blue eyes looked into mine,

You are going so far away.

I don’t know if I’ll see you.

There it was again.  That feeling rising in my throat.  No, not now.  Maybe later.

Her eyes smiled into mine.  Brimming.

Ok, c’mon, Mom.  You went far from home and still saw your mom.

There I was, trying to convince her.  Or, perhaps, myself?

There is no fooling wise eyes.  No matter how much they seem to forget.

Her hand touched mine.

Well, we will certainly see each other in heaven.

I don’t think in all my life that I have ever tried to fight tears like I did at that moment.  Why, I am not sure, but fight them I did.

Of course, Mom! 

But, we don’t have to go yet.

My mind racing… it’ll all work out.

Not to be undone by sadness or uncertainty… we danced.  Mom has a thing for polka music.  At midnight, she turned on her music despite my and my husband’s attempts to quiet the music for the sake of sleeping children.  No, we had to dance.  She is quite German that way.

The three of us danced polka and sang Biergarten Musik into the wee hours.

My 83-year-old mama, my warrior, and I.  We danced and my eyes brimmed.  No time for tears now.  Maybe later.

The morning came.  The truck loaded with kids and cargo.  Little arms wrapping and squeezing around these grandparents and then my turn.

Every time I leave them, I wonder…

No, not now.  It’s just too much right now.  Maybe later.

I could see their waving arms in the rearview.  Smiles.  A gift.

Our tail lights climbed the hill and disappeared.

The journey went on for days and days.  Rolling hills and green gave way to prairie, and desert, and majestic mountains.  The scenery mesmerized.  Sweltering humidity gave way to blistering heat.  It’s all sometimes just too much to take in.  You know that feeling when you can’t believe you are somewhere doing something until it’s over.  Then and only then can you see what was before you.  Only to find it is behind you in the rearview mirror.

We made it.  Road trip with a six pack.  All the way across this breathtaking land.  Mama sanity is over-rated anyway.

Sometimes it’s on the other side that we can finally see.

We can choose joy, you know.  Joy comes from the surrender.  The real surrender.

The feeling came back.  That feeling in my throat.  Here, right where I am.

It’ll all be ok.

This will all work out.

Just wait and see.

This is only the beginning.

I could only whisper it to myself.  Thoughts colliding like bumper cars in my mind.  Just almost too much to take in.

I could only whisper this to me.  Stripped of the old normal.  The comfortable.  The safe place I could squelch that nagging feeling in my throat with,

Maybe later.

Maybe there is no later.  Maybe the point is now.  Right now.

I told my girlfriends,

Live day-to-day.  That’s my new motto.  

I can only think about right now.  The rest of it is all sometimes too much.  It is meant to be taken in day-to-day doses.

We have right now and to live fully in this moment… is the point.  That is the gift.  It’s not a new idea.  Carpe diem has existed for ages.  Actually seizing the day takes practice.  So, here I am in this new normal.  That nagging feeling in my throat.  Here it is again… burning, brimming, blurring these eyes.  Maybe later has tricked me just a little bit.  Maybe later delays the sorrow… and the joy.  Maybe later, may be just all wrong.

Yes, here it is again.  That collision of sorrow and joy.  Maybe later…

May be now.

 

Matthew 6:33-34

But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.  Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.