June 23½ Again.

It’s June 23½. Again.

A year ago on this night, I wrote about the tenth anniversary of the very last evening my Ma spent on this earth. Tonight, I close my eyes and I’m there. June 2022, feeling the words pour out onto the screen. I’m there now. Thinking about how Dad and I wouldn’t leave her side, and while I knew she was fading, I felt the kicks of my unborn son reminding me there was a lot of life left in that hospital room. 

A lot of life was in there, until there wasn’t. 

A year ago in this very moment, I wrote about how ten years went by in the proverbial “blink of an eye,” and how I have this uncanny ability to re-experience the raw emotions I left in hospital Room 906 - at any time, in any setting, even for just a fleeting moment. There we were: Dad, Aunty Cookie, Uncle Don, Ajax, me (and baby Jimmy of course). That’s it. The evening of the 24th, we waited, we told her to go, we reassured that it would be okay for her, okay for us. All the things they tell you to say and to do, we did. And with four distinct breaths that I’m certain were gasps of “Hi! I’m so happy to see you” during her entrance into the Next Place, she let us know it was her time to go…from us. 

Ten years was tough. I cried a lot when I could, smiled when I could, and did what I could, when I could. 

Until I couldn’t. 

But what a difference a year makes…

Tonight, on June 23½, I write in the backyard. Alone. The kids are at their dad’s this weekend. The light breeze of solitude is entertaining me, the dog, the string lights illuminated above me, and it’s keeping my beer cold. On this, the second day of summer, even with all of the trees filled in on the golf course that separates us, I can see it. The light is on in what I’m guessing is Room 906. 

But writing tonight is different. Because, instead of looking for reasons why they are the way they are, I already know. And staring out past my backyard to 906, I smile, I feel relieved, and I see them. 

Fireflies. Lightning Bugs. Debate it on your own time, but don’t for one moment forget to appreciate them. For me, they are making the dark, not so dark. And they are making the solitude not-so-lonely. They are here for the night, until the morning, when they aren’t. I’m not sure where they will land while the sun will shine tomorrow, but I will remember and will be grateful for them for being a part of June 23½. Again.

The funny thing about lighting bugs is that you forget they exist until they don’t, usually around mid-June. And that first endearing spark reminds you of begging your Ma for a glass jar with holes haphazardly poked in the top so you can catch them with your cousins after a long day of swimming in the pool and playing ghost in the graveyard in your backyard. You caught them and then wondered the next morning why they wouldn’t spark. Took me all this time to realize why…it’s because they were trapped, unable to be free. Until they were and it was all over. What a shame. 

The light just went off in what I believe to be Room 906. Hopefully just for tonight so a patient, and the loved ones who won’t leave her side, can get some sleep. Until they can't.

Ma, I miss you and I love you. More. Any tears I have on June 23½ are because the holes in the jar are so large, this firefly will surely find her way… and damn, that journey is beautiful, bright, and all hers. But only because I learned from watching the BEST, navigating through life without ever losing her spark. 

I love you, Ma. 

xoxo,

Da.