His Smile

It popped into her head the moment she got the text. She could see the photograph in her mind before she even realized she was thinking. The unexpected news marched through her mind and across the face she wouldn't see again. But how could that be? He wasn't supposed to be gone. He had always been there: so unmovable and strong in her mind's eye. He had been there to help hold the wheel steady as she piloted the boat for the first time. To tug on her pigtails. To tease. The skin around his eyes would crinkle and his eyes would soften making her feel like the most special girl in the world.

She realized with a jolt that she was still standing at the foot of the stairs, phone in hand; the dreadful words still glowing in her tear blurred vision. The stairwell was almost silent, muffled giggles and scurrying feet betrayed the presence of her music fraternity sisters preparing for initiation on the other side of the door. Why now? Why tonight? With a shaky breath, she wiped away the tears leaking from her eyes. Her parents had told her to stay where she was. She could help anyway. Collecting her thoughts and building an emotional wall she prepared to return to the preparations. She just had to make it through the night, then she could process what had happened. She could be brave...she pushed the door open and walked back into the bustling room but didn't get very far before her painfully held back tears betrayed her. One of her sisters caught her in a fierce hug, and dragged her back into the stairwell to find out what was wrong. Taken off guard by her sister's actions, her wall broke like a dam and the sobbed explanation gushed out.

"My grandpa," she choked, "...the hospital...he collapsed...they don't think he made it." she shook as she lost the ability to speak. Her sister scurried away to find her a glass of water, only to be replaced by another who simply sat quietly and held her hand as she cried.

Finally convinced to leave the initiation by her concerned sisters, she was driven home. The house was still, except for her cat who scampered up to wind around her ankles as she dragged herself up the stairs. She wanted to see it. She knew she had it. That photograph. She dug through the assortment of school assignments and knick knacks on her desk that she had been meaning to organize for months until she found her photo album. She opened it and was taken aback to find that the picture she wanted was the first page - she had forgotten she put it there. He was smiling. It was a rare photographic occasion. She smiled back for a moment, then sank to the ground sobbing, clutching the photo to her chest. Holding tightly to her last reminder of his smile.

Her Anniversary

My mother broke every plate in the house that day. It was an important day: her 30^th wedding anniversary. She had set a lovely candlelit dinner for two and had worked all day to make dad’s favorite food just how he liked it. An hour before he would be home, she went upstairs to her room and took a shower. She did her hair and make-up in his favorite style. It was minimal: brown eye-liner and nude pink lipstick. Dad always told her that her face was too beautiful to cover in artificial shades. Her hair was twirled into a top knot, held in place by a silver flower she had worn on her wedding day. She tenderly picked up the dress she had laid out on the bed: his favorite black dress. He had bought the dress for her a couple years back. Mom had been in a slump and he wanted to prove to her that she was still his pretty little woman. The dress fit her like a glove and brought out the young woman he had married. Her preparations finished, she stood before the mirror and twirled. She smiled with the joy of a little girl as the skirt swirled softly around her knees. At exactly six o’clock, mom descended the stairs and sat at the table to await the arrival someone she knew would not arrive. Her husband would never come home again. 

I arrived home and hour later to find my mother on her knees in the middle of the kitchen floor surrounded by the shattered pieces of her blue wedding china. Her hair was falling out of the knot and hanging limply down around her shoulders. Her eyeliner stained her cheeks and the hem of her skirt was torn. She didn't move as I walked in, her red eyes seeing the past.

“I told him not to go, Katherine." She was so quiet I almost didn't hear her, "There was so much ice. I would have been fine without the cold medicine, but he was always so stubborn…” Her broke off as silent weeping stole her voice. Carefully I sat next to her and wrapped my arms around her shaking frame, pulling her away from the memories.

“I miss him, too, mom.”

Slow Down

When you glance at this page, you'll see a lot of words. Your first instinct is to skim and find the meat of what I've written. I'm not offended; I (Liz) do the same thing all the time. If it's more than a paragraph it's too many words. But - just for a minute - slow down with me. The world won't wait for you, I know...but you can afford a few minutes. It doesn't feel that way in the crazy, microwave-mentality generation we live in. In the time I take to type these words - and you take to read them - people will be born, will die, will find their fortune, or maybe even lose everything. But what is that to me? What does it matter if my nose is eternally to the grind stone, but I lose my passion? Lose what I love? I sell coffee for a living, but that isn't where I find joy.  I get really caught up in the day to day rush or life: my striving to provide for my tiny family. I want to be the best I can be at my job, therefore I am the queen of multitasking. (Okay...maybe not QUEEN...just the princess. *wink*) It's how I operate. I am good at my job and I do get satisfaction from a well run rush of coffee crazed people. (Don't be offended, coffee addict. I'm of of those crazies, too!) But, that satisfaction rings a little hollow. I navigate home through the traffic that is new to me, I feel like a pro. But I'm still just tired. I find some real satisfaction in making dinner. (Who knew I was a good cook?) Still, that shine of success doesn't last. I've ignored my real passion.

Sometimes, in the rush of life, I forget the joy of creating. But when I pause - when I stop to smell the roses in my own mind and pour out on paper the things I find among the petals...that's when I come alive. I rediscover the passion I drop when I get swept away in the rush of "success."

So, let me ask you: when was the last time you were really alive? When was the last time you created something? And how much longer before you pause and pick up your passion again? I promise, it's worth the time.

Photo credits:

Clock - via Photo Pin

Rose - via Photo Pin