It has been exactly 14 days since I received that fateful phone call at 6:33 a.m. I remember looking at the caller on the screen of my phone and knowing exactly what was going to be told to me - knowing a chapter of my life was about to close. In those 14 days since, I have had to tell people about it, tell people over and over again how I am okay and thankful that my dear Mama Debs is at peace now, and how I am happy she is no longer in pain.I have even convinced myself that I am okay to the point that I can speak about her passing with ease.
Today was such a stressful day at work, but one I handled with ease as well. I made every necessary phone call, wrote out every report that needed to be submitted, and dealt with the endless emotion that comes with my job. My coworker and I vented and shook our heads at our mutually hectic day with smiles on our faces because that is how I am programmed to handle all of the stress and distress in my life - with a smile on my face. And I don't know it all went wrong exactly; I did not feel like crying at work. I felt triumphant and accomplished by my day. However, and maybe it was the fact that "The Scientist" by Coldplay came on, or the fact that I absently allowed my buzzing mind slip into the darker realms of my brain, I lost it in my car and burst into tears. This is the first real breakdown I have had in these 14 days since Mama Debs' death, and boy does my heart really hurt right now. Really, all of these tears could be a manifestation of everything going on in my life. I keep lingering into the past and recalling how great life used to be when I was naive and more fun to be around and more like myself - when I wasn't lost in the desert.
No, I will not say that I regret moving out to Las Vegas. I moved out here to find myself, but Lord, am I finding out how hard being a "grown up" really is. I was so spoiled in LA. I was spoiled by friends and dreams and my beloved Mama Debs. I was cocky and ungrateful, floating by with my intense post-teenage invincibility haze where I was sure life would always be an endless beach beneath a glorious sunset; I would never get burned and when the sand was too hot, all I had to do was ride a wave to feel a cool rush that everything was okay. But the beaches here are far away, and the only coolness I can feel is when I run my blistered tongue over cracked, chapped lips. The desert isn't entirely dry. There is water out here. It just isn't fun to search so aimlessly. I have grown tired, I suppose. I wish things would be a bit more certain. I used to tell Mama Debs how right everything is here. When I would give her the rundown, it was always happy, progressive news. She would always tell me how proud of me she was; she always seemed to be more excited about my life than I was. When we hung up, I always felt better because I knew that I was being accountable to someone. Someone was watching over me, sending me strength from afar, and I was receiving it with open arms. I suppose I always assured her that I was just fine here because the last thing I wanted to do was to make her worry about me. I did not want her to waste any amount of strength worrying over me because she needed every amount of strength to get better. The cheeriness in her voice and the love that she sent to me through our cellphones gave me so much hope - hope for her, hope for myself, hope that one day she would watch me graduate with a B.A. and be there at my wedding and be one of the grandmothers to my future spawn. I prayed to God that this cancer would be a bad dream that we could all eventually wake from, something to forget about later on in the future; a down point equivalent to a bad day that we could be thankful to be rid of and never look back to.
But that hope would be futile.And while I am thankful my mother would find peace from such a terrible, evil thing, I still find it hard to believe that something so terrible and evil could possess her. Debs was nothing but a ray of light and hope to many. She gave so freely of herself and of her love, and it really hurts that that candle would be fated to go out so quickly. I find myself thinking about my last encounter with her and how much I needed to see her one last time before Sept. 4th at 6:33a.m. to tell her - even though she could not say it back to me - that I loved her and that I would make her proud. In these following weeks, I have been so blinded by my job and the desert that I haven't really processed everything, and maybe that's why I am being swept away by a wave of emotion now.
My coworker returned today from a trip to New York. She was a part of a wedding and she was able to see family and friends from her past. She told me that when she does take trips back, there is always a weirdness that follows her upon her return to Vegas. It is not a desire to move back to the east coast, but there is a period of time in which she must process that that is her old life and this is her new one, and this is where she belongs and wants to be. I agreed, thankful to hear from someone who doesn't share roots in my coast that there is a weirdness that follows a return to Vegas. I always feel it, as does my bestie and my boyfriend. But where my coworker, bestie and boyfriend can return freely to their homes of the past, for me there will always be that place where my Mama Debs used to be. There will always be that side of town that was so engraved into my driving patterns whenever I would return to the South Bay. And while her home, my home and the ever-strong and loving Linda will remain there, there will always be that one thing missing, the best thing, the most loving thing that I can never visit again. And yes, you may say the cliche line about her being forever in my heart, and while I may believe you, there will always be a Mama Debs-sized hole through my heart reminding me of how short and precious life is. It will remind me how stupid people can be but how we must forgive and forget because tomorrow does not come for us all. The only thing I regret was that I was not there more to enjoy those final moments of her life like those other precious and lucky individuals who watched Mama Debs transition into the end. That part will always haunt me.
And I pray to God that she always does.
