Just a Memory

What we have once enjoyed, we can never lose. All that we love deeply becomes a part of us.Take comfort in your memories, for they will be a part of you forever.

I was heading out the door a few days ago. Just a quick jaunt down the road to buy my favorite fountain soda...a must-have if I'm going to clean. Seems simple enough, doesn't it? After all, I do it all the time. So, I grabbed my wallet and keys and was just about to open the door to my garage when I was knocked to my knees. Literally, not figuratively. Within seconds I was struggling to breathe. My head was spinning. I was sweating and nauseous. It was all I could do to drag myself to bed and let the panic attack consume me. I just curled up into a ball and choked out sobs between gasps for air, as I waited for the pangs of fear to dissipate. Eventually, it stopped...and when it did I was emotionally and physically bankrupt. Within minutes, my entire day was sent into a tailspin. No fountain soda. No dusting. No laundry. Just silence and numbness...and fear. A deeply rooted fear I've been suppressing for a long time. A fear I don't think I've ever truly admitted to myself. 

The fear of forgetting. 

Forgetting the sound of Brittany's voice, the sound of her laugh...my laugh...because she inherited it from me. Her smile. Brittany's beautiful, carefree smile. Her stunning blue eyes that let the pureness of her heart and soul shine through. The way she frowned in frustration or was simply lost in thought when she twirled her hair around her finger...another odd trait we share. And I feel like those visions are slowly slipping away, not always as vivid in my mind as they once were.

Am I forgetting? Is my little girl becoming just a memory? Was she even real? Sometimes it seems too good to be true. How can someone so beautiful and perfect belong to me...be an actual physical, living, breathing part of me? Everything is changing. It's becoming different. And I don't like it. I don't like change and I don't like different. But I guess I started fighting that winless battle almost 29 months ago...the day Brittany left me behind to deal with this inevitable change...July 13, 2010. 

Yes, I have countless pictures of Brittany at all ages. I can stare at them all day, as I often do. I scatter them around me on the floor and lose myself in her. I close my eyes and try to hear her laugh...hear her say "Mommy, I wub you sooo much!" when she was just a tiny headful of tousled blonde hair. I try to remember the sound of her little voice when she would get into my makeup and beg me to put "yipstick" on her. I struggle to remember her voice say, "Momma" when she was happy or "Mother" when she was frustrated with me. But they're all just moments frozen in time now. No sound, no animation...just memories. I made a vow to myself a long time ago that I would never let that happen. I had to keep her real...tangible. Many parents who have experienced the death of their own children warned me that eventually it would, indeed, change...it would become different. "Well, maybe for them," I thought, "but certainly not for me!" Oh, how I was wrong. That's something I don't easily or often admit to, by the way. 

My biggest fear is happening. It is changing. And it is becoming different. And that scares me...a lot...because I don't know how to stop it. I don't want moments frozen in time. Of course I want the memories I already have..but I want more of them. I want new ones. Live, animated, tangible moments. And I will. They just won't be with my beautiful little girl. That's a bittersweet pill to swallow, my friends. And one I'm struggling to choke down.  

So I'm trying to hang on to the knowledge that God blessed me with Brittany for as long as He did. I'm trying to embrace the 21-years of memories He granted me. Memories that no one else shares. Absolutely no one. Memories held sacred between mother and daughter alone. Years of private conversations, inside jokes and secrets whispered in the dark. A bond of trust that allowed her to share not only her dreams with me, but her fears, too. Even memories of the countless hours I held her in my arms, wiping away her tears when she felt forgotten by someone she loved, but barely knew...those are memories I will never let go of, either. Not because I want to remember her pain, or the pain I felt for not being able to fix it, but to remember how it felt to hold her in my arms, stroke her hair and whisper that everything will be OK. To remember her beautiful blue eyes look up to me and say, "Thank you, mom. I love you and I'm so glad I have you...not just as my mom, but as my best friend." 

Are things changing? Is it becoming different? As sick as it makes me to admit it...yes. But one thing that time can never change or make different is the love I have for her...the love she has for me...and the bond we share that not even death can sever.

And you know what? I will make more memories with Brittany someday. Live, animated, tangible moments that will never be frozen in time...because she'll be waiting for me at the end of my life...blue eyes more brilliant than ever...a smile brighter than than sun...with Jesus by her side. I can only imagine me weeping and smiling and running into her outstretched, lanky arms saying, "I've missed you so much, pretty girl!" Maybe she'll even wipe away my tears this time and say,"I've missed you, too, mom! But now we have all of eternity to make new memories." And what a memorable, animated, tangible day that will be. 



I love you Brittany...timelessly <3