Month: September 2019

Coming of Age

~ Jenna ~ 1 Comment

There are so many things that can’t be put into words and so many other things that I wish I never had. 

Maisley kept asking where Poppi was when we were celebrating his birthday dinner. She asked if he was going to come down from the sky now. I got halfway through my beautiful explanation about how we can’t feel the wind but we know it’s there when she started asking for a french fry. 

Yesterday she asked, “What’s money?”

It’s hard to explain something when I don’t really know the answer myself.

This year has been my coming of age story. I’m not going off to college or leaving the house for the first time.  I’m not young and getting drunk with my crew of friends to ease the pain. 

It’s raw and awkward and I’m 32. 

For the first time in my life I have been forced to truly separate from one of my parents. The person who made me feel safe in the world. 

I’m a mother and I’m learning how to grow up, to find interdependence in all of my relationships, all the while raising two girls. A journey of coming to terms with all of my selves – past, present and future. A time where I question if some of the words I say are even mine. Where anger explodes to mask sadness or vulnerability. 

Maisley spent the first half of her first soccer practice picking her nose and the second half with her hands firmly on her hips, refusing to move or speak because some punk knocked her over in the goal. 

Sometimes we smile when we want to cry. Sometimes change, even when right, feels wrong. Sometimes, words are overrated.

September

~ Jenna ~ 1 Comment

“Tell your heart that the fear of suffering is worse than the suffering itself.” – Paulo Coelho

September is chock-full of change – new school year, Football season (eye-roll) and fall on the horizon. Grounded into the newness are lingering summer nights that leave me grasping for the memories and feelings of more carefree days. 

It’s officially September 2019 and I do not want to pass go. I do not want to collect $200. I just want to rewind the days. What if tomorrow was September 6th instead of September 8th? Land mines fill the month. Birthdays and all of the “last year at this time” memories. Last this and that. 

It seems impossible, and yet, we’ve survived impossible over the last year. Standing up after he died and speaking to nearly 1,000 people, that was impossible. Lindsey and Brandon’s wedding, impossible. Dark days of grief, impossible. Writing a book about him, also impossible. And yet, we’re doing it (and people do even wilder, more impossible things all the time). 

All of the impossible hasn’t been for nothing, it’s actually been for many things. Of which I will collect sometime in October. 

One of my biggest layers of resistance for September 29th is a sense that I need to relive that day. But why do I need to relive that day? Who says I do? In EMDR therapy last week I had an incredible moment of knowing (a message and gift from Dadio).  It was this: do what we loved to do. I had a beautiful vision of scouring the tide pools in one of our favorite places, Laguna Beach. So that’s what I will be doing.

As I’ve learned this year, it’s not going to be okay. It’s never going to be okay that he’s not here. But, I know that we can handle it (even if it’s not pretty), and I know that we are never alone (held every step by God and Dadio). Resilience is something that’s earned, it’s not just a given trait like curly hair or green eyes. 

What would my dad say? “It’s just another day”.

The Meeting Place

~ Jenna ~ 1 Comment

They met in the waves one foggy, August morning. Both in full wetsuits, all set in the lineup, with calm, friendly fins. 

And they met in the sky one sunny afternoon. Both in expansive wings, free flying the friendly skies, above the ground and the weight of the earth. Held in the arms of the wind. 

Time seemed to stop as these kindred spirits held the same space. If only for a breath; bound by the spiritual glue of the ocean and of the wind that belongs to everyone, to no one. That carries those who dare to drop in and leap, trusting that they will be carried. 

I wonder…who wants to be like who? Are the dolphins wishing for the stoke of the surfers? Do the birds envy the finesse of the paragliders? Or is it just us trying to shed our humanity and connect with the things our souls know to be true?

We’re all more alike than we are different; everything we can see with our eyes and that which we can only feel with our hearts. 

I’m just a girl, sitting on the beach, a witness to the converging of worlds, coincidently having a picnic with the squirrels.