One Trip Around the Sun

Twenty-four hours to a day, and then three hundred sixty-five of those, plus a slight bit more.

One rotation around the sun, the Earth, itself, rotating along its own invisible axis.

One year, and we are back to where we started, more or less in the exact same place in the void of space. Of course, other things aren’t the same: the other planets of our solar system are in different places for one, and who knows what else has happened in the universe. A ton of things have happened on our own planet. A ton of things have happened in my own life.

It’s been one year since my mom left us. It’s been one hell of a year.

I still miss her. A lot. I suppose that’s never going away.

“Jai,” I can hear her crystal clear in my mind, “we need more prune juice.”

“How many bottles?”

“Uh, uh,” she’ll exhale with each ‘uh,’ “how about two?”

“I’ll buy you eight,” I always said. You know, because lucky numbers. And because I didn’t want to have to keep buying bottles of prune juice every week. Chalk it up to my parents’ age.

“No, that’s too many…” she’ll complain.

But the moment the delivery arrives at her front door, she’ll be glad to have all of them.

I miss that.

I’ve thought about going to the store and buying eight bottles of prune juice, but let’s be honest: I don’t need them, I’m not going to drink them, and that’s a lot of money to spend on nostalgia. I’m not saying nostalgia isn’t sometimes worth it. But eight bottles of prune juice?

Here’s the thing though, and I’m scared to admit this: I’m not actually sure if it was eight bottles. It’s either eight or six. But it bothers me that I don’t know the actual number, not without looking it up in my journal or my old grocery store receipts.

It really bothers me.

It’s trivial—what if it’s actually five bottles—but it bothers me so much because it’s a sign, probably a healthy sign, but also an uncomfortable one.

I’m starting to edit my memories. I’m starting to pick out the feelings, the strongest and most important parts, and starting to leave out the details.

I’m starting to forget.

And its sister thought: I’m starting to move on.

It’s been one year since my mom left us. For a long time, I felt like the grief was never going to leave me. I know it will come in waves, forever, but for a long time, it felt like I just wasn’t dealing with it any better. It just hurt, and kept on hurting.

And in the right conditions, I don’t know if it’s a day of the week or something I eat or maybe I’ll someday learn it’s my chakras or Jesus or how the stars align or something, I’ll still start bawling.

But slowly, those moments come more at random. They’re harder to predict.

The days leading up to the one-year mark were vicious. I relived a lot of the days from exactly one year ago, the days where my mom was in the hospital, the days I felt straddled and weighed down with guilt, guilt that I had somehow made a mistake, that as a caregiver, somehow, I had failed.

Like the grief, the guilt never seemed to leave me. Like the grief, slowly, the guilt comes more at random now. It’s harder to predict.

But the one-year mark seems to be changing that.

I used to cry every time I went to see my mom’s grave.

When I went on the exact day, the exact one-year mark, I did not. I didn’t try to cry. I didn’t try not to. I just, didn’t.

I did what I usually do: I stood there, on the grassy lawn, eyes closed, feeling the wind brush against my face and comb through my hair, imagining her stepping out of a portal or something, walking up to talk to me.

“Hi, hi, hi,” she whispers under her breath, as she started doing as she aged, and then when she’s close enough, she lifts her head and makes eye contact. “Hi Jai!”

Usually, we have a conversation. Usually, I tell her about what’s going on in the world, with my dad, with my brother’s family, with me.

But on the exact day, everything felt, different.

When I tried to imagine her walking out to me, it was like that portal opened, but she didn’t walk through. She wasn’t there. We didn’t get to talk. And I was stuck with what I’ve always been stuck with: my imagination.

I felt guilty, again. But this wasn’t the same guilt. I felt guilty this time, because she felt farther away. Like the reality of her being gone is finally starting to sink in. Like I have to continue building my own life on this planet.

Like I have to move on.

Weirdly, it was the first time that I’ve honestly felt, well, better.

And now I just feel guilty about that. Like she raised me for eighteen years and was my mom for another sixteen and now I’m over her. This is my self-projection obviously. She would only ever say such a thing as a joke.

It’d go like this:

“Jai, you owe me money and time, because I gave so much to you.”

“Oh, is that how raising kids works?”

“Yes,” she’d laugh.

“Well I better start having kids then.”

She’d laugh again, and then she’d walk the whole thing back. “No, Jai, you know I am just kidding.”

That’s what she’d say, if we ever had that sort of conversation. And it gives me some amount of comfort, that I know that that’s what she would say.

After all, what parent wants their kid to cling and hold on?

I imagine the world a long time ago, so long ago, that if you or someone else you loved packed up and moved somewhere, it would probably be a final goodbye. You’d know that the other party was still alive, but it didn’t matter because you’d still probably never see them ever again.

Still, assuming the person leaving left for something better, you’d let them go; you’d want them to go.

Death is obviously a bit different. Who knows what comes after death. But for me, applying the same principle is helpful. My mom went somewhere she’s always wanted to go to, a place she’s always talked about going to.

Which leaves the rest of us behind, but I guess, I get to make another trip around the sun, and I’d better make the most of it.

It doesn’t change that I think about her every day. Sometimes for a few seconds. Sometimes for the whole day. And I imagine it’ll always be that way. Always.