Some nights are hard. I found myself tearing up frequently today. I called my second oldest son and heard my oldest son’s voice on his outgoing message. I wouldn’t ever want my son, who is alive, to change that message. Yet it makes me sad to hear the voice I will never hear say anything else except in my head. Later I caught a picture of my son at age 19 in a wedding picture with me. His friends used to ask him if I was his friend… What a compliment! What a lot of good it does me now. I can’t get him back and I miss him like crazy. I keep asking him when I get to see his ghost so we can have a conversation that isn’t just in my head. I get that he doesn’t really want to come back. He’s happier where he is, way happier. But what about me I ask him. Selfish, huh?
I went to El Salvador with my husband and two youngest children for a few weeks in December. That was a wonderful experience. When a butterfly stopped for me to take it’s picture, I believed Shawheen helped make it happen. I grieved there too.
On the way back we got stopped in customs. They threw away our pupusas, took my little dull tipped scissors, and both of my thick needles I used to sew granny squares together.
When I got home I still wanted to work on my crocheting. I asked my husband to stop and get me a new needle. He came back with a crochet hook I didn’t need. I gave in to just crochet more squares. Then something made me look in the bag where I kept the needles. I looked in the bag in the little cardboard and plastic package they came in, which had been empty since customs. There was the most useful needle, the thickest, dullest one, right where they had taken it from. It had reappeared!!! “Thanks, Shawheen!” I thought in my head. Suddenly there is this image of Shawheen with a silly outfit on, like 18th century maybe with knickers, a vest, and a cap in herringbone. He tips his cap and laughs with a little bow. He is clearly joking but also tickled that I recognized the needle as a gift from him.
I remember this now, tears sliding down my cheeks, crying for a half hour or more, missing my son. I appreciate his gifts but they can never make up for the loss of my son. the tears don’t do him justice. They only help ease the aching in my chest and reduce my anger.