wondering how you are

My friend and mentor texted me this morning: Wondering how you are.
Four simple words made the tears come.
And I’d been holding it together pretty well. (Or I’m getting really good at fooling myself.)

The funny thing is…earlier this morning I was thinking how much I missed Thing 2’s little face, and then it hit me, what I miss most is hearing her voice. Especially her giggle.
That kid has the most infectious giggle you’ve ever heard! Thing 1 once said that if she had to lose one of her senses, she wouldn’t want it to be her hearing because she didn’t know if she could live without hearing Thing 2’s giggle.
(In fact, Thing 2’s giggle is one of my four favorite sounds; the others are Thing 1 saying, “mommy”, the crack of a baseball bat making perfect contact with the ball, and a sound YBW makes when he sleeps.)

But I digress…
My friend and mentor asked if I had video of Thing 2. It’s curious, I have all the photos, but her dad has all the videos, so no, I don’t.
But then I realized I had a 55 second video on my phone of Thing 2 and my niece, Girlie Thing being goofy one afternoon in August. So I rubbed salt in my wound and watched it and here’s what I discovered:
1. Thing 2 sounds quite a bit like me. No longer does she have that squeaky little girl voice, but a strong, rich alto. I was surprised by how much she sounds like me.
2. The giggles you hear more than anyone’s are mine.
3. Girlie Thing and Thing 2 were destined to be in each other’s lives.

Thing 2 and Girlie Thing were being silly and I was so amused, I began to film them.
Thing 2 caught me and said, “Stop filming us!”
She flashed me the ‘double finger’ and said, “Ha! Now you can’t post this!” Then the fingers again.
I laughed and said, “I’m just keeping it for fun.”
“To watch when you’re sad?” She asked.
I giggled and said, “Yes.”
Girlie Thing said, “Yeah, save it for when you miss me.”

Um…are these girls psychic? Am I? Did we know the world as we knew it was about to implode?
No. We were just having a fun afternoon hanging out…each of us thinking it was one afternoon out of the hundreds to come…
It isn’t. There aren’t any more coming…at least not yet.

YBW was ironing new dining room curtains (I know! Isn’t he the BEST!?!) while I was on the phone with Thing 1 the other day. When I hung up, he said something to the effect of, I noticed you didn’t say anything to Thing 1 about what’s going on with Thing 2.
My reply was, “It’s not my story to tell.”
He seemed to feel very strongly it was and was all, next time you talk to Thing 1 she’s going to be like, Mommy why didn’t you tell me about Thing 2?
I don’t know.
Thing 2 might not have the balls to tell her sister.
Or my real fear: Thing 1 will applaud Thing 2. (Does that make me paranoid?)

My darling sister-in-law texted me expressing her love and support after she read my last post, and asking why I didn’t call her with this news.
I don’t know.
I’m still figuring out how to function with it.
I love her so for reaching out to me when I know how hard it is for her.

I packed up all Thing 2’s belongings from her home here and sent them in a box to her home there. Good God, that was painful, packing her meds and clothes and special stuffed animals. I almost kept her favorite special sleeping lovey, Lamby. Not out of spite, but because I felt I wanted to keep a precious part of her. I even wrote her a note explaining why I kept Lamby and sealed up the box. It rode around in the backseat of my car for a week before I actually sent it…and in the meantime, I wrote a new note and put Lamby in the box. Lamby belongs to her, not me.

I am overwhelmed and I feel quiet.
I should be finishing up a paper for school as my term ends next week…I don’t want to write about American History, I don’t want to think about Economics. I want to hug my sweet baby and hear her voice.

As Grandaddy would have said, “You’re old enough for your wants not to hurt you.”

So I’m going back to work…then I’m going to snuggle on the sofa with YBW.