{"id":368,"date":"2013-12-02T20:10:57","date_gmt":"2013-12-02T20:10:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/robinbotie.com\/blog\/?p=368"},"modified":"2014-08-30T15:32:04","modified_gmt":"2014-08-30T19:32:04","slug":"healing-from-loss-catawampus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/robinbotie.com\/blog\/healing-from-loss-catawampus\/","title":{"rendered":"Healing from Loss: Catawampus"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Catawampus<\/a><\/p>\n

A friend lets go of her walker and slowly backs into the passenger seat of my car.
\n\u201cI\u2019m all catawampus,\u201d she says, after she lands slumped at an awkward angle and I try to adjust the seatbelt around her.
\n\u201cWhat a great word,\u201d I say, thinking that\u2019s exactly how I feel sometimes. Especially in the holiday season when everyone else is dashing out to go shopping while I sit home hugging my dog. My friends are making toasts over Thanksgiving and I can only think of my Uncle Martin who just died. I’m out of kilter. Catawampus.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou got through all of your troubles,\u201d says my Aunt Bope, days later, at the gathering after her husband\u2019s funeral. At the cemetery, family and friends had taken turns shoveling soil into the grave. I\u2019d watched her high heels sink into the soggy ground as my cousin helped her lift the shovel.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou will too. You\u2019re strong,\u201d I say over a plate of fruit salad and rainbow cookies. She shakes her head, no. I look\u00a0 into her eyes that are so like my own. \u201cWe both are,\u201d I insist, pointing out that her mother, my Omi Rosie, was the strongest person we ever knew. But I wonder how she will get over this. She was happily married to Martin for 66 years, over 2\/3 of her lifetime. The 20-year-old daughter I lost was with me barely 1\/3 of my time. That’s been hard enough.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019re young,\u201d she says. \u201cIt\u2019s different.\u201d
\nI look at my feet and don\u2019t know what to say. I do feel young. Now. But I remember how unsteadily I walked on the frozen mud when my daughter died. The ground was uneven and ungiving. Back then I couldn\u2019t find enough to hold onto and did not want to face another day.<\/p>\n

To my Aunt Bope \u2026 to the friend of a friend who recently lost a daughter \u2026 to another dear one who wonders how her world disintegrated \u2026 to all of us who carry sadness during a season that is shocked by bright lights and raucous cheer, I just want to say:
\nDo not think your life is over or that you will never laugh again. The pain of loss will soften. Life will not always be catawampus.<\/p>\n

I look down, speechless before my aunt. That\u2019s when I notice —<\/p>\n

\u201cStay strong. Take care of yourself. And eat,\u201d I say, feeling less worried.<\/p>\n

— My Aunt Bope is still wearing her heels.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A friend lets go of her walker and slowly backs into the passenger seat of my car. “I’m all catawampus,” she says, after she lands slumped at an awkward angle and I try to adjust the seatbelt around her. “What a great word,” I say, thinking that’s exactly how I feel sometimes. Especially in the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[6,5],"class_list":["post-368","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-25","tag-catawampus","tag-thanksgiving"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/robinbotie.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/368","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/robinbotie.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/robinbotie.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/robinbotie.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/robinbotie.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=368"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/robinbotie.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/368\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/robinbotie.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=368"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/robinbotie.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=368"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/robinbotie.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=368"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}