Please Remind Me.

November 17, 1948. That’s the day my mother was born.

November is the worst month. It’s getting darker daily. Colder, too. Everything is dying.

My mother is already dead. It’s said we all start dying the minute we’re born but she really took that to heart.

Come April, when spring is upon us and my mother’s deathday looms, I won’t be this sad. Her death was an end to her suffering, and an easing of my own struggles around that. The light of spring is hope and losing her finally on that day in April doesn’t feel as sad as this reminder of her birth. Then, my memories of my mother won’t be clouded by sadness and pain.

But I am sad in November. The lost hope of what could have been and the towering mound of if-only wishes are all too much in November. Everything else that happens, both in my little world and in the larger world around me, amplifies my own grief. It’s like a pair of mirrors, each shines off the other creating endless reflections of sadness until I can’t fight it off any longer.

The darkness of November continues to creep in and it wears me down until I’m nothing. I feel damaged beyond repair, ruined by who my mother was and what she made me. Her death was supposed to be the end of me feeling this way. I have been cheated.

November is knowing that nothing, absolutely nothing in this world, can take any of the hope I once had and make it real. As unlikely as any sort of healing was while she was alive, I could still hope. I could still pretend. November reminds me of my naivety and foolishness. November reminds me that it’s all set it stone now.

She would have been 67 today. Would have been.

When you see me and I seem tired, or I have a look on my face or a heaviness on my soul, it’s just November. If you could, remind me that the seasons change and spring will be here eventually.

This is yeah write’s nomo Day 17.

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14 thoughts on “Please Remind Me.

  1. Samantha Brinn Merel

    Michelle, this is beautiful and heartbreaking. Winter always feels like the longest season because it is so dark and cold and the weight of that can be so hard to bear. But before you know it, the sun’s warmth will be shining on your face, the world will be green, and your soul will be light. Sending you lots of love friend.

  2. Samantha S

    I have many favorite lines from this Michelle, but here’s the one that will stay with me: “November reminds me that it’s all set it stone now.” Just lovely, even in grief.

  3. Chef's Last Diet

    Michelle, I’d love to sit and talk to you for about ten hours and we could talk about how the past is both irrevocable and malleable. I’d love to try to convince you that you can change November whenever you are ready to.

    1. michellelongo Post author

      I’d love to sit and talk with you too. November is such a tough one, but I do believe you.

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