rough birthday

Back in Singapore for a few days, then heading to Koh Samui, Thailand on Friday for a long weekend before I head back to San Francisco on Tuesday. I've posted Bali pictures here.

But I need to have a wee janetvscancer moment.

Forget marking the passage of time, getting older. Forget reflecting on where I'm going and/or where I've been. I don't care about any of that - I really don't. This birthday has been like ice water dumped on my head. My Mom is actually dead. She died. She's gone. I think there's a huge part of me that really had no concept of this fact, but having a birthday really brought it home (Clancy I love you). I'm startling to realize that I won't ever get her happybirthdaysong phone call, won't get a card with her lovely swirly writing, won't be made to feel like the world should seriously stop spinning for 24 hours and pause to wish me a happy birthday - cuz she always managed to make her kids feel that way (not that any of us asked for it).

So I've cried uncontrollably in thoroughly inappropriate places (ATM stalls, airports, airplanes) these past two days. Maybe I'm working through something but I don't know. It feels more like I have a huge gaping wound that just keeps bleeding and bleeding and bleeding. I'm happy to be far away but at the same time it's really hard. I feel a visceral need to be near my siblings, huddled in some corner together.

I wrote this in my lyrics book in January or February, shortly after she was diagnosed. Maybe someday soon it'll be in a song (I have a few brewing):

In an instant my life changed forever
I can't recall how it was before
The tears splash hard
She always told me they used to stain my clothes
The moments in between things are huge and weighty
Nothing matters now except her
It's funny how you turn a corner and suddenly everything's different
The wrapped up in my problems thing just seems so silly
It's so bare and raw and simple, what really matters
The rest is so ridiculous

I love you Mama