Vacuuming, Nesting, and Rebirth

As I dragged the couch out from the wall to vacuum behind and underneath it with almost fanatical detail, I asked myself what was I doing? Vacuuming was not on my list of goals for the day, not even for the week. We had just vacuumed on Saturday. But there I was running the attachment along all the floorboards and sills, corners and stairs, procrastination? Possibly. Then I realized, after finding a clump of fur hiding and being almost giddy as I was sucking it up, that I am nesting.

I recognize this compulsive drive to get everything in order, the energy that comes unbidden to drag the dog bed off to another room, to wrestle with unwieldy furniture so that all is exposed, nesting. Four huge bags ready for Vietnam Veterans to pick up tomorrow morning. Closets and drawers completely rooted through and now breathing with space. The bookcases look like a mole ran through them, long standing occupants have been evicted and those left on the shelf are tilting to and fro unused to where they now live – perhaps they are even wondering if they are next.

Nesting. I have been here before, this I understand. Shelves, mantels, walls, rooms, clean, open, some might say empty, I say pregnant with possibility. See this fits, I loved being pregnant, the happiest moments I have ever known. Birthing, not so much. Scared me beyond any fear I had ever known, and yet there was no way around it. I told anyone who would listen to me when I was in labor with Justin that I would come back tomorrow to do this, I just couldn’t today. Not much has changed, birthing still scares me.

Since September I have felt like my skin is too tight, and the sensation distracting, this last month I have used the term “distracted living” in describing myself. The chrysalis finally cracked last week, I was standing at the kitchen window and was grateful to have been able to capture my thought at that moment, here is what I wrote in my journal:

“I think I almost get it. Justin is dead. I can’t change that, ever. But I can resolve to be open to the pain and allow it to sculpt me. To carve out that which is not human in me, to smooth the rough edges, at the same time allowing rough, growing edges.”

I have not been in denial of Justin’s death, but there is a rebirth happening, both his and mine. I am a mother, a woman, giving life is what I do, it’s what I know. I have spent hours in silence, not thinking, just being, waiting for the chrysalis to drop off, to honor the shell that held new life, to be still while new wings, vulnerable and wet, dried and strengthened. And I read, a most insightful book, a book that left me sobbing at the table as I recognized myself. As I was reading The Holy Longing by Fr. Ronald Rolheiser, I found the validation and strength I needed for labor, the mystery and wonder of rebirth contained in the paschal mystery as we live it in our own lives. The deaths we die, the grief and mourning, the necessity for grief and mourning, allowing our dead dreams and past lives to ascend to the Father and await the new spirit that he has to give us to live our new lives. The old does not fit anymore, the metamorphosis is complete. The new embrace of spirit and flesh, the communing of new born with mother.

This rebirth does not mean that my bereavement is over, by no means, it is the deeper embrace of who I am as a bereaved mother. It is the embrace of the knowledge that I can’t speak our child’s name out loud to that child’s father without tears, it is the knowledge that the birthing process can be long, but we can labor together to embrace the new life given. Even our marriage must die and be reborn, accepting the new spirit of married life as bereaved parents.

Legacy. Now this woman past the years of childbearing will give birth once again, to herself and to Justin’s legacy. I have pages of Justin’s favorite quotes and insights culled from stacks of notebooks and journals, he left us his soul print. And so I find myself in labor again, so familiar, the waves of pain, the brief respite, the sweat and tears, the feeling of being stretched beyond endurance, but the promise of Justin’s legacy, what will be his lasting memory inspires me to see this creation through to fruition.

I give all my dead dreams and hopes to the Father, no one takes them from me, I lay them down of my own free will, I watch them ascend as gifts to the Father, they were good dreams and hopes, and now I await the new spirit that he has for me to live my new life.