I come home from a grueling day mentally exhausted. It is nearing 9:30 at night and am so numb with upset that I am barely able to keep my eyes from welling up with tears. As I ride the Metro home I look amongst the other riders and wonder if any of them can find the white picket fence that I grew up thinking existed in the world. When we hit the Metro Center stop I realize by observation that many other people have no concept of the white picket fence; they are better compared to a real life Jerry Springer Show. I cannot understand their arrant behavior nor do I want to.
By the time I walk in the door I have spent over fifteen hours today dealing with things that I never wanted to know existed in the world. I walk in the door and simply change clothes and go to bed hoping that what I see and deal with everyday really does not exist and it is just a bad dream. My nerves are shot and I know that today I am more than spent because tomorrow it is the anniversary date of my mother's death.
I accept that I am numb tonight and I cannot write. I want my mom. I want to be able to call my mom and talk to her and I cannot. I want to go back to that comfort and safety that I felt before the word cancer came into our world and took her away from me. I want to try to understand why my last memory of my dying mother is of her volleying a laundry basket across the kitchen floor; because if it was the last thing she did, she wanted to wash my uniform for school. I want to know why my mother would put others first, even if it was with her last bit of strength. I want to know why my mother had the energy to be a good parent while on her death bed; yet the people I deal with on a regular basis are lazy and uninvolved in being responsible parents when they have nothing but time. I want to know why my mother had to be taken away when she was so good; yet all she ever really wanted to do was live to watch me grow into an adult.
Tonight I want, yet I want nothing material and nothing that can ever be replaced or solved. My white picket fence was taken away from me when my mother died. Reality is that the white picket fence does not exist.
