Happy Happy Birthday Baby

My Mom died yesterday. On her birthday. Ten years ago. According to Webster an anniversary is the annual recurrence of a date marking a notable event. So yesterday was the anniversary of my mother's death (or deathiversary as some of the more Tim Burtonesque in our family have dubbed it). In a perfectly bookended piece of poetry, it is also the anniversary of her birth. So what does that mean? I don't know. Here's what I know: the day and days leading up to this deathiversary leave me with a dull, empty feeling, like something is amiss, like I have a project due that I haven't even addressed, like I can't get that little piece of abrasive grit out of the eyeball of my soul. Yesterday, all day long I had a faint desire for some sort of monumental "moment" in which homage would be paid to my mother on the tenth anniversary of her death and sixty-ninth anniversary of her life. Somebody should say something shouldn't they? Actually a few people in my family sent out emails that failed to hit the spot for me. As Randy Jackson would say: "It just didn't do it for me dawg." The grit remained in its secreted niche.

And then I was watching Lost. I love that show. My siblings and I have a private chatroom in which we discuss the literal, moral, and mostly spiritual significance of the various bits and pieces of Lost. You'd have to understand all the ins and outs and twists and turns of this show for me to set up the scene that gave me my much awaited "moment". Instead of giving you a synopsis, I'll just throw out the briefest of a context. A woman (I still don't even know this character's name) is sobbing over the death of another character Jacob. Holding a gun to Jacob's murderer, she tells this character named Benjamin, "He is the closest thing to a father I ever had." Her heart is clearly broken and she is about to exact her revenge on Benjamin by taking his life in return for the life of her beloved Jacob. Knowing he has done wrong and been wrong and has failed completely, Benjamin begs for mercy to be allowed to run away. The mourning woman asks, "Where will you go?" Benjamin tells her his plans to take up with a character that epitomizes evil because, after all, "He's the only one who will have me." In an act of sudden and surprising mercy, she lowers her gun and tells him, "I'll have you."

This briefest act of mercy reminded me of my Mom and all she stood for, all she taught me, how she lived her life and ultimately The One after whom she modeled her life. And I got my momentous occasion. Tears washed away that nasty piece of grit as I contemplated the life of a merciful woman.

My son Antonio was born today. On his birthday. Eighteen years ago. My mom used to joke about how, if the doctors hadn't tried to stop my labor because he was three weeks early, Antonio would have been born on her birthday. I am eternally grateful for those doctors today because, with her death, March 9th became a very crowded day. Still, this reprieve only allows me one short day to recuperate and pull up my happy pants to celebrate the birth of my eldest child. Every year I feel guilty for the shadow that is cast over his day. The year my mom died, we travelled on Antonio's eighth birthday back to Maine to attend the funeral. In a complete daze, I hoped that visiting with his multitude of cousins would constitute a party of sorts. My brother Tom got him a wooden train with the block letters Toño spelled out in train cars. Sweet of him because that was the only celebration Antonio got that year...that I can recall. Every year thereafter, I have wondered if he is affected by the whiff of sorrow that surrounds his day.

Last night's Lost, again, brought me some thoughts on this matter. There is this character, a woman named Sun. I love her and the way she has developed into a maternal, nurturing, giving, supportive and ultimately strong woman over the course of this series. She is a steadying influence. Last night her friends returned from being missing for a period of time. As they walked onto the beach, the joy that radiated from her face was beautiful. The wide embrace with which she greeted these "lost" loved ones reminded me, again, of my mom. I imagine if she met my Antonio again she would be so delighted to see him. She would run across the sand to throw her arms around him and tell him how she had missed him so. She would touch his hair and tell him how tall he had gotten. She would tell him how thrilled she was that he loved to sing songs and play the guitar. She would listen to all of his songs and then insist he teach her to play. She would slip her arm into his and walk with him along the water and tell him funny stories about herself and ask him all about what had happened to him in the last ten years. She would ask him about his girlfriend....she would want every detail because she loves romance. She would ask him about his plans for the future. She would love him so much. She would be so proud of him. And then she would play him a game of "gotcha last". He doesn't even know about this game, it's one of things he's missed out on. But she would show him how to play and they would run and play and laugh and fall into the sand in a tangle of exhausted hilarity when she finally won.

When I feel sandy grit of my mother's death, it is the missing of these moments that abrades the most. And yet, I have a hope that there will be a reunion and all the missed moments will be made complete. Strange how a show like Lost can remind me of that hope and help to wash away the grit of another year. And so I can pull on my happy pants and be the mother who is celebrating the eighteenth year of her son's life.

Happy Birthday Antonio. I love you. Bunny would be so pleased.