like silence, but not really silent

I wanted to thank you for the many expressions of love and compassion (and poetry) you’ve extended to our family over the past few days. As the days have grown shorter and chillier, it’s been so tempting to curl up into cozy corners and tune things out. I’ve been resisting that urge with all my might, pushing myself out of doors at every opportunity. Last Sunday night I ran and ran and ran until the moon was high and the sidewalks were dark.

On Tuesday it rained, and traffic was snarled, and with M out of town, I was on pickup duty. We were just a few blocks from home and quiet and warmth, but back out we went – with umbrellas – looking for candlelight and community.

Wednesday night was colder still, and so tempting to stay home with the family back together. But I threw on my coat for a late class where we practiced in the dark and watched the moon rise through the windows. Thursday I ran again for the last time after work this season. My commute home will be dark for the coming months, and I’ll miss the detours on foot that I love so much. It was brisk and chilly, but the sun was brilliant and low. I ran through tunnels of sunbeams for most of my route, until everything turned rose-hued and dusky. Saturday we dressed up and sat in the theatre watching Matilda; later than evening we dressed up a little differently and walked the misty, winding streets for treats.

Sunday I ran through red, red trees, the sun warm again, like early fall.

We made curried squash and sorted candy and reread Matilda and watched a few minutes of baseball and turned in early between pre-warmed sheets. I finished the final chapter of my book which involved a really sad dying scene and then an epilogue in Paris, but I didn’t cry. I didn’t cry much this week (I covered those bases just fine the week before.) I cried a little on my run Thursday, and when I read the card from Erin’s parents telling us how they were thinking of us this week, and when I saw that photo again of her pigtails, the one in the lower left corner of one of her posters.

I’m crying now because it’s time to start another week, another season, another turn of the clocks, another set of holidays without her. I’m crying now because as I write about my past week, I realize just how many ways we sought out and found joy in our days, even the hard ones, even the cold and damp and dreary ones. I cry because my girls are so smart and so beautiful and so hilarious and so maddening and so loud and so loved. I cried a little during Matilda because nobody loved her at all, and also when she sang the song “Quiet” – 

Quiet…
Like silence, but not really silent…
Just that still sort of quiet
Like the sound of a page being turned in a book,
Or a pause in a walk in the woods.

Quiet…
Like silence, but not really silent…
Just that nice kind of quiet,
Like the sound when you lie upside down in your bed.
Just the sound of your heart in your head…

– because how perfect are those words? They describe the way I entered into this past week, and they outline the ways in which I’m trying (always trying) to let sadness rest a little easier on my shoulders by looking for the quiet moments of beauty and joy and peace in this messy, complicated, imperfect life.