How Are You? - an update

It seems the 'How are you?' question is being thrown around more often now that we are hitting a season when apparently I will miss my mom more than I miss her on a normal day. I do have to say I don't necessarily think that's true. I miss her for different reasons, and those reasons are indeed tied to a specific month of the year, but it's not like on the 26th all the sudden I'm going to miss her less.

I am, however, going through another wave of crying which may or may not have to do with what I wish was happening right now. I wish I was getting daily calls about things 'screaming my name' or her checking on what time I fly in a million times as if my flight schedule isn't hanging right behind the phone, or us planning which cookies we are going to make on which day, or knowing that she is planning out which neighborhoods we are going to drive through to look at lights, or...I could do this all day.

It also may be tied to the fact that it's been 4 months...4 months never seemed so long. I know I'm not the only one who has found these last 4 months so long and difficult. Last Wednesday my dad wrote this and sent it to me:

Some say GOD's been talk’n to me.
What a scary thought.
That He would try and teach me things.
That no one else been taught.

I just think I’m think’n things.
I’ve known for many years.
They are all come’n together now.
It’s just noise between my ears.

I wake up early morning.
With questions in my mind.
Soon find the answers in there too.
Just needed lots more time.

I can’t stop think’n about my wife.
And all the times we had.
She was every bit, all my life.
And the thoughts now make me sad.

I know that GOD is in this thing.
He’s been with me through the tears.
I know the answers come from Him.
It’s not just noise between my ears.

Sometimes I have to struggle.
Just to get through one more day.
When everyone else around me.
Continues on, their merry way.

I know it’s not their problem.
And I know it’s not their pain.
But don’t they see me crying?
Just because I don’t complain.

GOD has me in his loving arms.
He will help me through my fears.
All my questions, answered there.
With noise between my ears.

So for those who have been asking, that is the best way I can describe how I am - I know it's not your problem, and I'm trying not to complain, I know God has me and will help me, but there are still a whole lot of questions in my brain, some days I have to struggle more than others just to get through, and while I appreciate the moments of joy that I find, the moments of sorrow are similarly overwhelming. The problem is, there is really nothing anyone can do, including myself, other than wait. Wait until the pain fades...but does it really? Am I really ever going to stop wishing my mom was planning out our Christmas light route? And how long with it take for me to not notice Thursday as a different day of the week than every other day because it marks another week gone by? At what point does my will to get through become stronger than my want to have her back?

In 1864, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow wrote the words to 'I Heard the Bells', a Christmas song that I've never really paid attention to. That is until I heard Casting Crowns sing it this year. This was written in the midst of the Civil War, after Longfellow's wife died unexpectedly and his oldest son was injured in the war. The poem, which later became a song, speaks of despair, but ends with confident hope and triumphant peace. I have yet to understand how I will ever feel those again, but I will say with Longfellow's bells 'God is not dead, nor does he sleep'. I may not feel it, but in my heart I hear them.