Tag Archives: Cole Bent

Soul Tired

1 Jan

I suppose I should write something profound and holiday spirited, after all this is the first day of the new year.  But I tell you the truth, my soul is exhausted which makes for a significant roadblock to meandering philosophical terrain.

I am home and gratefully receiving a time of rest.  Last night, for new year’s eve, I had the beautiful opportunity to get cozy on the couch and fall asleep at 7:30p.m. (pacific time).  Earlier in the day Brian, Esther and I had an outing along the coast–they on roller-skates and I on my Raleigh Twenty.  Today Esther, the dog Piper, and I had a long coastal walk on the sands of The Strand and Salt Creek beach while Brian surfed San Onofre.  Yesterday and today I have been busy in the kitchen enjoying the freedom to cook without a time constraint, though our pangs of hunger were slightly dictating the direction of each meal.  Both days I have been leisurely popping p-nut M&M’s in my mouth which have followed my, vegetable/whole grain rich, meals very well.  And now as I attempt to write an engaging piece of prose, my daughter sits beside me as my husband and our two dogs relax on the floor finding solace in the comforting tones of Henry Mancini’s Peter Gunn.

Aaahh, what a life…what a nice break from the running I have been doing since May of 2013 (and well before).  And though my heart and mind are thinking of a hundred different people (friends/family) I’d like to connect with, or pieces of garments I would like to sew, or sweet treats to make, I am resigned to the fact that this rest is most necessary.  In fact, so much so, that I recognize the folly that would ensue should I not completely and properly receive this gift of a respite.  For Brian, Esther and I are most definitely in agreement in regard to our current status–grief is a heavy to burden to carry, and as result we are soul tired.

Being in a ‘soul tired’ state means I don’t have much to offer right now.  Not much by way of conversation.  Not much by way of inspiration.  Not much by way of supplication.  Just not much.  I’m giving myself (ourselves) one year…

One year to indulge the weight of grief.  One year to just sit and be.  One year to receive a bit more than I give.  One year of staying at home and being quiet (in my free time of course).  And so, even though we have the celebration of a new year upon us, for me, we are mid year.  Mid grief.  Mid loss.  A “Happy New Year” will have to wait–at least the celebration of it.  Our gifts and celebratory actions are found in the solitude of the love we share with each other.  The hope and complete understanding of Heaven and the knowledge Cole has made it into Home-Base before us.  We just have to rest here a bit, and endure the weight, until our souls become more accustomed to the heavy load.

An anecdotal story:

Esther wears a “military dog-tag” necklace in honor of her brother.  They are not his U.S. Marine tags (though we have them in our possession), it is a special edition made for her in honor of him.  While in the produce section of Costco the other day, the kind-hearted employee asked, “for whom do you wear the dog tag?”  To which she replied, “my brother.”  His response was precious, “Very good!  Let us keep him in prayer and bring him home safe.”

Esther and I looked at each other and concurred, “he has indeed made it safely home.”

…now how about them oranges?!

Disney World

The Bent 3

 

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Going Straight

2 Nov

Bottm line, I am not ready for my son to be gone.  Now that I’ve got that out, let us move up from there.

Seems a redunt statement, the one I wrote above.  Actually, it is redundant.  Of course I’m not ready.  Is anyone ever ready to say goodbye to their child?  Brian’s grandmother wasn’t ready when her daughter, his mom, left this earth at 59 years of age back in 2007.  Even with all of her suffering from disease, she had been an integral part of her family unit.  She lived with her mother the last several years of her life and was again melded into the routine of her parents household (sans her father who had departed previously, answering Heaven’s call in 1981).  Brian’s grandmother, Granny as we called her, had aclimated once again to having her daughter around, in and out and there.  So even her daughters suffering, though painful as it was to witness, became a part of their life.  And loosing that influence, that continual option for relationship, had profound significance for Granny.

Same too is our loss of Cole.  He was reintegrated into our daily lives after taking his brief two year stint away from us while serving as a United States Marine.  We had bid him adieu the day he reported to his new family, the military, and the Bent 3 learned how to operate sans his presence.  But when he came home after his brain tumor surgery, we reaclimated as a family unit of 4.  The Bent Four—daily.

There is no easy way to face having Cole’s life not with us.  For even as I turned the calendar from October to November (just this morning), the calendar my beautiful cousin made for me with custom photos of family events the year prior, it reminds me of what we were doing, Cole included, this month last year.  I flipped the calendar as I waited for my coffee to reheat in the microwave and there the story unfolded.  Crystal Cove, Laguna Beach, last year with the family.  And I had to face that Cole is not here.  Brian caught wind of something inside of me and said, “what’s wrong?”  I tearfully could only answer, “he’s not here!”  So Brian went to look at the calendar, “but there are no photos of Cole on this page?”  “I know.  But he was there.”

The most difficult task within this journey of mourning is…I honestly cannot finish this thought, for I cannot pinpoint what is most difficult.  But flipping the calendar and remembering our times together is hard.  Next year, when I flip the calendar I will remember my sorrow in rememberence, but this year I remember the tangibility of him.

It is a strange new reality for us Bents.  Living as three, especially as our lives were so encompassed on being four.  Even Cole’s service dog is a reminder for me of the void present without my son, as now after five months of not seeing her rightful owner, she has attached herself  fully to me.  I don’t want her attached to me (though I am now equally fond of her), I want her attached to Cole!  Esther, who has been holding down the fort of our home during the week while Brian and I work in San Diego, is out of sorts.  Though she, in her fast approaching 18years, doesn’t necessarily need her brother every minute of every day, hates that he isn’t here and feels the silence of our new life too profoundly.  The silence overwhelms.

It is as if our life is confused.  Unsure and a bit wayward.  Which actually brings me to my title, Going Straight.

After 43 years of being a naturally, very curly haired individual, my hair has gone straight!  What the heck?  Rivka with straight hair?  Seems impossible!  Yet it is true.  I get out of the shower and my hair air dries without so much as a curly root.  As weird as this phenomenon is, it really pays tribute to the strange new life we are grappling with daily.  A nod to the function within the non-functioning.  What? Does that even make sense?  No, it doesn’t.  Functioning doesn’t even make sense to any of us right now, yet functioning we are.  Differently, confused, and even chaotic though not as chaos would normally present itself.  It isn’t cacaphony, it is melody within tumult.  We are functioning and moving forward in many ways, yet life is not quite right.  And my hair reflects the phenomena of the effects of this disruption to our family unit.

Don’t take my presentation the wrong way, having straight hair is a dream come true for me.  I have always felt my Creator mistakingly bestowed the wrong coif to me at the onset.  But having it now, and only in this last month (as I painstainkingly dealt with unruly hair the entire time in Europe and Japan this past summer thanks to forgetting my voltage converter), is strangely odd.  Yet the oddity I embrace as all of my life, our life, our Bent 3 life, is out of place, strange, and unfamiliar.

So let’s just called it what it is, unnaturally natural, and raise a glass to going straight.  Cheers!

straight hair

Walking the straight and narrow…

Trust in the Lord with all of your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to Him and He will make your paths straight.   Proverbs 3:5-6

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Respite-ting

13 Oct

Today I am theoretically covering all mirrors and clocks.  Today I am living a wish fulfilled.  A wish I have longed for since May 17th 2013, the day the hand of the Lord reached out to my son and offered him peace.  A wish for silence, a wish for life to stop, a wish for rest.  Today, I am respiting.  And I am thankful.

I have no plans.  I have no need to shower.  I have no need to speak.  I have no need to change out of my pajamas.  Today I am quiet.

Today I have time to ponder ridiculous notions such as, “I wonder when the next earthquake will hit?”  Or, “Why so many spiders?”  Today, I even considered picking up a book and reading.  I even feel inclined to read an email from a friend, who back in June, sent me her reflections,  A Story of Cole, which up to this point I haven’t had the strength to read.   …today is nice.

I have been given the gift of a four-day weekend.  Esther is at work, Brian at the Rose Bowl, and me at home alone with no thoughts of having to begin my work week tomorrow.  Yay.

Yesterday I had to attend a baby shower.  I was part of the cooking crew and therefore had to get things done.  Coincidentally, the shower was held in the same location as that of my son’s funeral reception.  That was a tough assignment, but navigated with the concentrated focus on the mother-to-be and her happy occasion, her growing boy inside.  The hired assistants were a mother and daughter team.  They were part of our clean up crew, and very warm and hospitable women.  Unbeknownst to them, they shared with me the last time they were hired to help clean up after a “party.”  They explained to me it was for a funeral, and the flowers were beautiful.  This conversation came toward the end of the baby shower, when we had been working alongside eachother for a few hours.  I said to them, that funeral was for my son.  The gracious mother began to cry and hugged me, explaining that she had seen a photo of the young man with beautiful eyes, not realizing he was my son.

And then, she explained her own loss of her first born, her one and only son.  He was diagnosed with Leukemia at the age of 19 and died one month later.  That was 6 years ago.  She explained how her lovely daughter had lost her best friend, her older brother.  And they both were sad for me, for the newness of my loss, for Esther, and for us–us being, all women who have lost a child, all families who have lost a significant member.  A club neither of us wishes to be a part of.

She praised me, this lovely woman whom I would have never known was my kindred, for my ability to smile…

I have gotten used to having to put on the mask of ‘whatever the occassion requires’.  I have gotten used to life forcing me to live and put one step in front of the other.  I have gotten used to smiling for the purpose of spreading joy and allowing joy to be fulfilled.  And so it was, at the baby shower, that I was able to focus on the blessing of the birth and mask my sorrow further.

Oh Esther and I did shed some tears, out on the street, away from the festivities.  And I did receive the comforting condolences of the new found friend with tears in my eyes.  But I quickly blotted my cheeks and resumed.

But today…I don’t have to pretend.  Today, I am given the gift of pause.  I like today.  I can also appreciate better my gift as I have next weekend to look forward to.  Next weekend I go away for my annual ‘girlfriend weekend’.  A tradition my long time friend and I began when our children were young.  We are both in a place of transition and that will make our weekend together a blessing.  A time for us both to just be.  We don’t have to pretend with eachother, and that will be good.  Ironically, even our destination will be different.  Change is the theme of this year!  Two weeks ago we received a call from our hotel alerting us that they have been sold and will be under renovation.  So after a good 10 years of staying in the same place, in the same room, we are being forced to explore a new adventure.  And in years past this would have thrown us for an emotional loop.  But not this time.  This new direction, given our circumstances, just seems par for the course (I can’t believe I am borrowing a term from a sport I loathe–golf.  Oh well, so be it.).

Today I reflect on many things…

My aunt who lost her husband the month before Cole had surgery.  I understand her rejections of offer to travel.  Home feels right, home is a comfort.  My cousins neighbor, who lost her fiance in the attacks of 9/11.  I understand her emmigration to California from New York, her need to escape the pain of her loss and I understand that though she has just welcomed her second baby into her California family, her love for her fallen remains.  I think of the family whose young freshman daughter collapsed and died while running cross country for her high school, this time of year back in 2007.  I understand that though it has been a few years since the tragic loss, the sorrow that results takes years to adjust to.  I reflect upon the rippling that ensues upon a family unit as result.  I know all too well my own rippling.

And yet, it is my aunt from whom I draw strength.  For while in her sorrow, she has remained available–even hospitable.  Strength from the hired help, whose warm presence would never have given their own loss away.  Strength from the neighbor whose courage is reflected in her new life.  Strength from so many who suffer and who do not allow sufferings touch to define all that they are.

Most days, I am surviving.  But today, as I am given a respite from the ‘having to’, I can thrive just a little bit.  My “covered mirrors and clocks” are gifting me the pause I have been longing for.  Today is ok.  Today, I am ok.

Today I am thankful.

 

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