The Dark Valley and the Empty Chair

The title of this post is the title of a presentation I have given several times to school groups, with stories about some of the people who are buried in the Nashville City Cemetery, which is one of my favorite historic sites in Nashville, and I love giving this presentation.  I use the "hook" of "ghost stories", which seems to get the kids' interest, but then I tell mostly true stories about the people who are buried there (and elsewhere, since Andrew Jackson makes an appearance in the stories about William Carroll, Jesse Benton, and Charles Dickinson).

Today was the first time this school year that I have given this particular presentation.   I wasn't concerned talking about death, burials, cemeteries.  I was more concerned that I was going to John Early, Mitchell's middle school.  I had a little breakdown in the parking lot -- it was the first time I had made that drive, pulled up to that building, and as I walked up, I could just see him talking to his friends, Marcus, Noah, Jonathan, Isabel, Amina, Adrian, Nick, Beck....     Thanks to my friend Becky, she let me have a good cry in the office, and told me I could do it.

I did.  And I enjoyed it.  We had an exceptionally good group of 5th grade students, who were interested, took notes, asked pertinent questions, went off on tangents, and seemed genuinely excited to learn more.  These are the good things --the things he enjoyed, that we enjoyed together -- visiting historic sites, talking about the fun stories to be found in the past.  Becky was right -- this is one way to honor him.  I don't think I did especially well, but the kids were into it, and helped me get more into it.  And Becky stayed right beside me the whole time.

On a different note, other friends who are in our club are marking a sad anniversary today.  I remember how I felt when I learned their son left us to go to heaven.  I have watched them in church on Sunday mornings, and wondered how they did it -- how they displayed such strength and grace, and marveled at how they display their faith.  I still don't know how they do it, but I guess I am learning.  One foot in front of the other, mainly because that is the only thing any of us can do.  So please, in your thoughts and prayers today, remember Sam and his family.  Surround them with peace and love as you continue to surround us.  I have a feeling maybe Sam and Mitchell are talking Predators hockey. 

The Helpers

I am not feeling particularly strong.  People keep saying "You are so strong."  Not really.  Every day is hard.  Some are harder than others, and some days are simply next to impossible.  Just about every day, we get a piece of college mail addressed to Mitchell, or I get an email about ACT deadlines, or a tweet from his high school, or one of his friends celebrates a birthday or a hockey goal.  Everything, every one of these things, is just another reminder of something Mitchell doesn't get to do, of something we don't get to celebrate with him.

People say "I don't know how you do it."  No, you don't.  Most of the time, neither do we.

But yet, we try.  Right now, mainly we try for Carson.  It does not honor Mitchell, and it does not help any of us, to just sit around.  So we will honor Mitchell by LIVING.  We will go to hockey games, to football games, on trips.  Carson will still play -- #playformitch, right?  We will try to be #18foreverstrong, and to keep #18's memory forever strong.

A meme circulates every year around September 11, with Fred Rogers from "Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood" talking about "the helpers".  I too am comforted by realizing that there are so many helpers -- so many caring people.  Angels don't always have halos, and heroes don't always wear uniforms.  You all are my helper-heroes, for every kind word, every action, no matter how big or small, every meal you've brought or bought, every time Carson is invited on an outing, every text and message.

Terrible Wonderful

This has been a terrible wonderful week.  Please note, I did not say "terribly wonderful."  Those are two different things.

Terrible.  On August 30, we had to mark the two-month mark of Mitchell's leaving us.  On September 3, we marked the three-month mark of the day we went to the hospital.  He has been gone two months.  He hasn't talked to me in three months.  Days 30 and 3.

Terrible.  We had to go to the funeral home this week to look at the proof for his marker to go in the cemetery.  That was going to be bad enough.  To add to that, when we looked at it, they had the name wrong.  Instead of Mitchell's name, they had Mike's name.  Apparently they had looked at the wrong line on the contract.  So, I had to go back again once they fixed that.  Not exactly reassuring, and I am sure it was even more surreal for Mike than it was for me.

Wonderful.  This week, our friends at Zanies Nashville hosted TWO fund-raising events for Mitchell.  Wednesday night featured Reno Collier and three other comedians, who were all hysterically funny and made us all laugh -- and we all need to laugh.  We were so blessed to have so many friends come to enjoy the comedy, and to laugh with us.  The second night was an event called "Bumps, Bruises, and Bedtime Stories" and featured four former NHL players, all of whom played for the Nashville Predators, including Stu (the "Grim Reaper") Grimson, Jim McKenzie, JP ("Coach") Dumont, and Chris ("Mace") Mason. These four men generously donated their time to tell funny stories from their days in the NHL, and brought out a big crowd of our hockey family, friends, and hockey fans that don't know us at all.  Laughter -- and a lot of it!

Chris Mason, Jim McKenzie, JP Dumont, Stu Grimson & Andrew Dorfman at Zanies.

September 3, 2015

Photo by Stephanie Greene

Wonderful.  Both nights included both silent and live auction items, donated by generous folks in the community -- many personal friends of ours, but many others donated by people who just wanted to help.  The generosity of so many, both the donors and the people who bid so generously, made me cry -- in a good way.  Thank you to so many people!  The Nashville Predators; Blue Chair Bay Rum; Tennessee Preservation Trust; the MHC Foundation; Compass Photography; Andrew Jackson's Hermitage; Echoes of Nashville; my generous friends who represent Pampered Chef, Young Living, Younique, Rodan & Fields, and so many more.

As much fun as we have had the last couple of nights, it does make me sad to wonder if Mitchell knew how many people loved him, how many people love our family because of him.  Teenage boys aren't known for sharing their feelings all that much, especially when they are talking about and to each other.  But I can tell you, there isn't a group of boys that alternately loves and hates each other more than the Nashville hockey community.  They may hate each other when they are playing against each other, but when the chips are down, those boys are all going to be there for each other.

Peter and Mitchell, March 3, 2015

Terrible, and wonderful.  I am guessing that describes the rest of our lives.  Terrible, because we will always miss Mitchell.  Wonderful, because we all had him in our lives.  Terrible and Wonderful, because his loss has given us all of you.

First Day of School

Moms everywhere are posting about their kids' first day of school.  Cute photos, all of them, showing excited kindergarten and first graders, indifferent middle schoolers, sleepy high schoolers.  Some moms are what I call Pinterest Moms, with fancy lettered blackboards indicating what grade, what teacher, what school.  Others, more my style, are just happy if their kids will even look at the camera.  (My personal favorite was the selfie one mom posted, showing her middle schooler in the back seat of the car -- you know who you are!)


I hope each and every one of your children had a blessed first day back to school, even if it wasn't wonderful.  For so many of you, I know it wasn't wonderful.  Too many of you went to a high school that felt like something was missing -- because it was.  Because HE is missing.  I don't know if you look at an empty desk in American Studies and think he should be there -- he should.  He was so excited about getting in to American Studies, and had picked two books off the reading list for this summer.  I read them both instead.  He already had an idea for his first article for his Journalism class (about the new gym at school -- he had an "in" with the historic zoning people who helped guide the design), but won't be on the masthead this year.  He wasn't looking quite as optimistically at Physics or Algebra III, and was probably still holding a grudge that he didn't get in AP Human Geography, and frankly, he was worried about AP European History.   He loved his high school.  He loved the challenge, he loved his friends, he loved the community there.  He loved the days when he got to "eat out" for lunch.

The school library made a display including some of his favorite books.  If you need a "Mitchell Reading List" here are some of the ones that were included:

• Harry Potter (series)  
• Hunger Games (series) 
• To Kill a Mockingbird (and I included "Go Set a Watchman" because I know he would have read that, too)  
•  
• And Then There Were None (Agatha Christie)
• Catching Lincoln's Killer (and Manhunt, by the same author)
• Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime
• The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
• A Walk in the Woods

and the two books he was excited about for American Studies summer reading:

• Summer, 1927  
• Devil in the White City 

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Meanwhile, two kids had totally different first day of school pictures to make this year.  Both without Mitchell.  Carson, of course, has had six (counting kindergarten) first day of school pictures with his brother.  This year, we took one without him, even though neither of us really felt like we were into it.  And for ten years, we have taken a First Day of School picture of Mitchell and his best friend. They met in kindergarten, so we don't have a FDoS photo of them from then (although we have a bunch of others from that year!), but beginning in first grade, and every year since, we have a FDoS photo of the two of them -- even when we had to meet at Chik-Fil-A after school because they went to different middle and high schools.  No one, not even the two of them, could explain their friendship.  We have always joked that these two shared a brain.  More than "friends", definitely not "boyfriend/girlfriend", closer than "brother/sister."  I love her (and her sister) like my own daughters, but have no idea how to define their friendship.  Those girls don't have brothers, and my boys don't have sisters, but I think these four kiddos are as close as any siblings ever could be.  

Like many other "firsts" we have ahead of us, our "First Day of School" will never be the same.

One month ago...

One month ago today, we carried our son Home.

That morning began with an anticipated surgery for a tracheotomy.  I had dreaded that procedure for a week or more, but it went so quickly, and so well, that we exhaled, and hoped that we were getting ready to turn a corner we had been trying to get to for so very many days.  Our relief that morning was short-lived, as other doctors determined that blood clots necessitated a fifth heart surgery in three weeks.

The rest, they say, is history.  But it isn't history.  It is every single moment.  It is in lazy summer mornings, every load of laundry, every time I ask a little brother to take out the trash or empty the dishwasher.  (They used to argue about "I have to do EVERYTHING" -- now he has no one to blame it on.)  It is in unread summer reading, overdue library books, unopened AP scores, a stack of college mail.  It is in hockey schedules and school shopping.

Grief is sneaky.  I never know what will set it off, and sometimes, I can't figure out what "it" was.  But sometimes I can. Yesterday, I went to get my hair cut, and five minutes in, the man in the chair next to me started talking to his stylist about how his wife's mom had died a couple of weeks ago, and he kept going on and on about how she was crying every day and the stages of grief.  Apparently I had a little bit of a panic attack.

We are searching for the new normal.  For how to live our lives without Mitchell.  For someone so quiet, he certainly was a large personality and presence, and filling the void he leaves will be forever impossible.  We can't sit around and cry all the time.  As I told C, we are still a family, we can still have good times and we can still have fun.   But every smile and laugh makes me feel guilty, makes me think how much he would enjoy that moment, too.

I am so thankful for the sixteen years we got.  But selfishly, I don't think it was enough.

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