I was watching Return to Zero (google it).
You can tell it was written by someone who lost a child.
It's little things. It's the little details; symbols and rites that only those who have lost a child understand.
I know them.
As watching this movie rips open a wound that will never heal, I ponder.
I have long known these truths, but I want to write them anyway.
I have learned that there is nothing I can do with my life; nothing big enough or great enough or impactful enough to honor them.
I have learned that there is nothing large enough that I can do to remember them.
Even if I could write their names as big as the sky, as bright as the light from 1,000 suns...even if I could plant 6,000 trees, or build a dozen parks...I could never, ever do enough.
Chelsea is the closest link to them. But she is not them, and she will never be them. They are them. They are the only biological sons I ever saw. I lost them both.
I cannot be great enough to ever honor them enough. I can't, so I know that trying is futile. It has to be something else.
I cannot integrate the experiences of their life and death in a way that takes away the scar.
We are alone, in the failing light of that hospital room. And they are there...their paper thin skin pressed against pale blue and white blankets. The nurse approaches. She has the wheelchair.
The panic rises to my chin.
"Please," I beg in a voice no louder than a whisper. "Please don't take them out of this room. Please let us leave them here."
We have to leave them. We have to go through the act of leaving them, because they have already left us. We must disconnect on our own terms because we have controlled so little.
We say goodbye, touching faces for one last moment. They are cradled together. I can see them in my mind, with heads gently touching.
And I never see them again.
There is nothing greater or bigger or more defining than losing a child. It is a gigantic part of who I am, and yet I cannot describe how that manifests or what that even means.
There is only one person on the planet who shared that experience with me.
I have to remember that.
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