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Krrobi

Teacher / Writer

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small deaths

Kim Sisto Robinson

Somebody once told me that the changes in our lives are like “small deaths.”  This beautifully describes how I am feeling right now about the loss of my eighteen year old son’s high school, happy-go-lucky, boyhood days.  I am mourning the passing of him, his very presence. I missed school shopping in September.  I grieve our reading time together; we read all the Shilo books, the Goosebump books; the Junie Bee books.  We’d lounge on his small bunk bed studying for History tests.  I learned every single capital in the United States (I should know them anyhow!). I was educated about Generl E. Lee’s defeat at Gettysburg in 1863.  And I actually learned how uniquely astonishing my son was (IS) during those reading, studying, lazy Sundays.

Driving home Saturday from grocery shopping, it all hit me like a gush of sadness, as if sorrow were coming through my open windows rather than a crisp breeze, as if I were awakened by a hand slapping my cheek.  ‘”YOUR SON IS OUTTA HIGH SCHOOL.  HE DOES NOT NEED YOU ANYMORE.”  And what am I if I’m not needed?  What am I, damn it, if I’m not helping out at school, attending high school soccer games, conferences, or preparing for Fall Balls?

What am I?

The trees in Duluth, Minnesota are like burning mandarin, scarlet and sun-gold salsa dancers.  I mean, it’s like a bloody Mardi Gras of color here at the moment, but all I observed on the way home were the leaves that were falling to the ground, the leaves that were losing their blood.  And being in the frame of mind I was in, this somber place of loss, I couldn’t see the beauty in any of this, only the transformation and metamorphosis, the trees becoming bare bone and skeletal, the small deaths.  I saw one season grasping onto its life—and another season waiting to slide in.

I thought of my son.  I thought about what Renee had said about “kissing baby bellies.”  I thought about the way he used to giggle and anticipate and sprint into my arms when I’d pick him up from the church nursery. I though about when he said he could never live without me.  I thought about my first conference when the teacher looked at me with a massive smile and said, “Alex Robinson’s mother? Oh, I’ve been   looking forward to this one!” I thought about everything—like somebody dying who suddenly sees her life mapped out in front of her,  snap shots,  flashes, and images of her existence for the last time.

I’ve felt these “small deaths” before; for example, on the first day of Kindergarten. That bus leaving a trail of smoke behind while mothers stood by sniffling and standing until the orange tint of that vehicle turned the corner into the unknown.  I’ve felt it when my first son received his license, and I said to him “I’m terrified. I have no control.  I wonder if you get into an accident, somebody might be drunk, and what about the other guy.” I finally grabbed his seventeen year old hand and prayed, “Our Father who art in heaven…”

I uderstand this is the ‘circle of life,’ and I know our children must depart from their mothers and boyhood ways, grow into maturity, become independent, and find their own paths, but it hurts.  It damn well hurts. And I am sad about this small death today, this blink-of-an-eye adjustment, this charming, chubby baby becoming a man.  I’m reminded of a story my mentor, Vera, told me.  “I looked at my son one day as he was brushing his teeth as he’s done every morning, and I noticed he had these strong muscles in his back, hair on his chin.”  She told me she had to leave the room to go have a quick cry before she fixed him breakfast.

So I am writing down my hurt in my blog today, because this somehow lessens the pain, releases the truth, and reveals what my brain looks like on paper. This is the way I’ve always survived change.  Perhaps, this is the reason I am alive today, because without writing, I would simply shrivel up and drown inside my own words.  Tomorrow I will be alright, but today, I am stained with the scorched colors of leaves.  Today I am trying to redefine myself.  Today I have experienced one of those small deaths.

*When is the last time change has made you reconsider yourpath in life, the definition you have of yourself?