Journey Through the Great Sadness

My parents aren’t getting any younger. And yet, they continue to work as if they were in their 20’s. The work they do, they say, is better than “real work”. My mother was always a homemaker (the toughest job in the world) and my dad is twice retired: once from the US Army and once from the SC Department of Corrections. My parents love to work on things that will help me and my older brother. For example, they came up this past weekend to help me and Kurt on some landscaping projects. This wasn’t easy stuff either. Pulling up miles of English Ivy isn’t the work of wimps. And we did it in 90-degree weather. Even though mom and dad are in the mid-to-late 60’s and their health issues limit them in some ways, they can still work me under the table when it comes to hard stuff like yard work.

I tried my best to keep up with them, and for the most part I succeeded. The last day in the yard wore me slap out (as we would say in the south). I found it humorous and quite comforting that my parents were more worried about me than themselves.

“Take a break,” they often chided.

They were the ones who should have been taking a break. But they didn’t.

The work they did was during the week when Indiana was struck with tornadoes and floods of historic proportions. Growing up in South Carolina, we’re used to hurricane warnings and hot temperatures. Tornadoes were a rarity for us. Indiana is part of Tornado Alley, and I’m not particularly thrilled when the tornado siren sounds. (On test days, Fletcher and I usually hide in the bathroom!)

My husband always makes me feel safe and secure but there’s just something about having mom and dad close by that adds to that safety and security. The storms were rough but I was never really worried. Between Kurt and my parents, I knew we were all going to be ok.

I realized not long after they left to return to SC that they were what was missing in the moments after 9/11. Living in DC was hard enough but I didn’t have any friends there. I didn’t particularly like the person I was dating and living with at the time (it’s a long story and another blog entirely!). And I certainly wasn’t all too thrilled with the people I worked with either. Everyone had their own lives to live. Power and success forced everyone to stay at an arm’s length from real, intimate relationships.

When I heard the sound of the plane crash into the Pentagon, my thoughts immediately turned to my parents. Frozen in fear, all I wanted was mommy and daddy. They would know how to handle this situation. They would know how to keep me safe and secure. But they weren’t there.

I called and spoke to them on the phone before most cell phone connections went blank. They were glad to hear I was safe and were as riveted by the events as much as the next person. I’m not entirely sure they knew exactly how close I was to the Pentagon. And I don’t think it was until a few years later – when I finally crashed – when they realized how traumatized I had been that day. I don’t blame them for not knowing. I was a journalist, after all. We were all strong and neutral and able to handle covering this type of news, right?

And I’m certain I put on a strong front for them, just like I did while I worked in the yard this past weekend. “Oh, I can handle this,” I kept telling myself that day and in the yard. “I’m a big girl now, and I want to make them proud.”

I don’t think it really matters how old you are. There’s still nothing like mommy and daddy to make you feel completely safe and secure.