Not a Day Goes By

This year I understand better than ever why each year I watch and listen for all those hours, to all those names, to all those memories.

I was "lucky" enough not to lose anyone I knew eleven years ago today. No person I knew by name.

But in the past few years, the family I do know by name has had something of a tidal wave of loss.  I've shared a lot of it here.

My best friend's amazing mother, another mother to me, I told you about her.  http://everlovingmess.blogspot.com/2010/02/my-best-friends-mother.html

And there's my cousin Lily, a baby girl we lost when she was not quite ready to be born. And my cousin William, a baby boy, just ready to be born but didn't stay--both babies just as much our family as any I've been privileged to hold in my arms.

Just about one year ago it was my Uncle Dan and my cousin Kevin, a week apart from each other, I told you about them too.  http://everlovingmess.blogspot.com/2011/12/if-theres-top-ten-list-of-reasons-why-i_07.html

Then my Papa, our patriarch--equal parts wisdom, curmudgeon, and comic, all parts immeasurable love. You met him too in  http://everlovingmess.blogspot.com/2011/12/if-theres-top-ten-list-of-reasons-why-i_07.html.  That was just a little bit before we knew how close we were to losing him on top of it all.

And even my furry brother, Maxie boy--I still expect to hear his collar jingle when I go up the stairs at my mom and dad's, and sometimes I swear I do.

All these losses were hideous. Pretty much none of them a gentle fading into sleep after a long life of vibrant health. It was all shock and sickness and disbelief. All of them equally agonizing to bear for those of us still walking around here on the ground.

But here's the thing. I've been watching the ones closest to the ones who died, watching them very carefully, the ones the most run through by these losses, starting with my brilliant light of a mother, and on and on from there.  And the way they've carried on and loved and laughed and worked and played and shined light into the world...it's really boggled my brain. A miracle beyond the power of words to relate, although I try my best.

So it hit me as I watched and listened to all those "strangers" speaking from those microphones downtown this morning. They were doing it too. Through pain that should have buried them all, they are alive. And I don't mean "alive" as in just breathing in and out and sleepwalking through their days. I mean alive so brightly it cracks my heart open to see their faces and hear their words.

Strangers, my ass. Nobody's a stranger. One of these days that'll dawn on us all.  And it won't occur to anyone to make it his or her life's work to shower pain and anguish into the lives of others, because there will be no "others." And that'll mean the end of the need for any more remembrances like today's.

It's coming.

Don't believe the naysayers, they know nothing.

Just look for signs.