Ripped

Ripped.

That was yesterday’s theme.  It hurt and we bled.  And one of us had memory loss — Sid called me an hour or so after Sidney and I left.  He could not remember us actually leaving, though he had helped me pack the car, hugged me before I got in, hovered close while I hugged our other children and stood in the driveway watching us drive off.

I guess stress reveals itself in different ways.  We also cope in different ways.

I cope by remembering, which is ironic because I have a terrible memory.  That is why I write — to remember.  And these are the memories I sifted as I made that 10 hour drive to Memphis . . .

eating supper with six of us around the table again

Cello music in the house

sorting through hand-me-downs with the girls, creating piles of out-grown clothes and hanging up clothes that fit

kayaking on the Sound with my husband

baking cookies

violin music in the house

eating too much ice cream together while we watched Once Upon A Time

Sid and I crying while we danced in the kitchen, cookies baked in the oven and the sun set over the Sound

sitting on the deck at the beach house and tracking the curvature of the earth

sitting on the deck at the beach house and watching the sun set over the sound, then jumping up really fast to try “catching” the sun so we could watch it set a 2nd time

Sid and I sitting on opposite ends of a couch at the beach house, he reading Amy-Jill Levine, me reading Peter Gomes

Rachel finding a blue crab

Lincoln washing dishes and singing, drawing Prairie into song with him

music lessons

teaching spanish pronunciation during family school

Lincoln’s birthday

Clarinet music in the house

Lots of singing in the house, especially 2 brothers harmonizing