A cry disaster

This anecdote popped up a few days ago as a Facebook memory from 2016.

Jackson, as Charlie cries: "Make him stop! He's hurting my ears!"

Me: "I can't make him stop crying. He's sad."

Jackson: "But if he keeps crying then I'm going to cry too and then it will be a cry disaster. Is that what you want?

Sunday was full of Father’s Day posts, and today and other recent days have been full of memories of Father’s Days past – 5+ years-old posts about my dad when he was still alive (and about me missing him after that); and 13 years of Father’s Day posts about Andy.

We didn’t celebrate Father’s Day this year. The only way I acknowledged it was by calling my brother, and I probably wouldn’t have thought to do that if I hadn’t been working on the endless sorting and packing of stuff and found an old Scott City baseball cap I thought he might want.

At one point in the morning, I mentioned to the boys it was Father’s Day. They didn’t know. I didn’t expand on the topic.

We had a mission for the day: shopping for new summer clothes for their summer camp that starts in a few days. We focused on that. They walked around the mall without me and bought a few things for camp; then we met up and headed back home. They chatted about friends in Los Angeles and friends from camp and some new music, and I tried to pay attention but my mind kept wandering.

I wondered if I should mention that it was our first Father’s Day without Andy, and I wondered if they had been thinking about that too.

I wondered if they wanted to talk about it, or if it would be too much.

I wondered if I should remind them how much he loved them, and how he would have given anything for more time with them.

I wondered what would happen to this easy day of shopping and conversations and laughter.

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Jackson and Charlie graduated from 8^th grade last week, although Jackson did not participate in the event or any of the festivities leading up to it (a movie night, bowling, laser tag).

The graduation was on Tuesday and it was hard to sit there seeing the boy who never apologized to Jackson up on the stage.

I tried not to think about Andy because I was afraid I would have to leave and find a place to sob so I wouldn’t ruin the event (though the very loud toddler in attendance almost did that on his own).

I was happy to see Charlie give a perfect delivery of the speech he wrote for the occasion. He did an amazing job.

On Wednesday Brian Wilson died.

There was a party for the graduates on Thursday, and the email invitation stated that no siblings were allowed, only graduates, and though I don’t think the hosts meant that to specifically exclude Jackson, he didn’t want to go anyway.

Charlie did want to go. So I went with him, full of dread, asking him to let me sit in the car before I got out and listen to “Midnight Sun” by Ella Fitzgerald to calm myself down.

The kid who did apologize was there, along with his mom. I enjoyed spending time with her.

The other kid – the one who didn’t apologize – was also there with his parents. I had planned to talk to his mom. I had even discussed how to do it with my sister-in-law. I was going to intercept her somewhere and tell her that her son made an incredibly difficult time in Jackson’s life even worse.

And then I sat next to another mom in one of the only empty chairs, and the unapologetic mom was on the other side of that mom. The mom in the middle asked me why Jackson wasn’t there. And I said, in a voice that I knew was loud enough for the unapologetic mom to hear, “he didn’t feel comfortable being here.”

In that moment I decided I didn’t need to say anything to her.

So all that was the lead up to the first Father’s Day without Andy.

Every day I wake up and my heart feels like a clenched fist and my jaw is tight, and I have to remember the strategies from my therapist and try to meditate, and breathe, and name my emotions and then sit with them until they subside, and snuggle with Meowy, and listen to “Midnight Sun” with my eyes closed, and when all that fails, take a gummy or a hydroxyzine or on the worst days, Lorazepam. I’m not sure those even help. I think they just make me sleepy.

And so, as I drove home from the mall with the boys, I did not mention that it was Father’s Day because I knew that if I thought about it too much, I would start to cry and I was afraid the boys would start to cry and then we would have a cry disaster. And no one wants that.