Digressing here . . . . Let me get on to what I really want to say today:
No more sparkling sense of humor. No more smile that brightened any room she walked into. No more honest intimacy. No more warmth. No heartbeat. No more hugs.
I remember being devastated and angry. The moment I saw the first televised pictures of the Pentagon in flames, I knew she was gone. I was alone. I fell to my couch and began to sob. Then, I realized that no one had told me she wasn't okay. Maybe, she was. I called my mom. She told me that her husband was okay, but no one had seen Rhonda yet. This was enough to confirm the loss for me. My sobs resumed. But then, I stopped crying by the time the rest of my family was in grief.
I remember feeling confused when a stranger who told me that he was a high military official was assigned to my family and that he was calling me to invite me to be flown with the rest of my family to Washington for the memorial services. I felt confused. It seemed intrusive. I didn't know how to respond and my not-so-sensitive husband at the time said: "You can't leave. You need to take care of our child." She was almost 8. Guess he didn't know how to take care of his own daughter . . . .
The long-story short, is that I never grieved. I was angry and confused when our family had a memorial service closer to home that featured the Purple Heart ceremony. I didn't understand how the Purple Heart was supposed to soothe anything. When my niece and nephews had to go the rest of their lives without their mom.
So, I never cried.
But every year on the anniversary, I felt a rise of confusion and anger once again. This year was no exception. The only difference is now I am married to a loving man with whom I am safe. This year, all of the T.V. references brought a tear to the surface. Casual conversations brought me back to discussing how strange it is to have people talking about something in a casual way that has personal relevance. People saying: "Where were you when it happened?" doesn't seem to compare to "Who do you love that was killed?"
My husband, sensitive enough to see it still troubled me too much, turned the channel or gently told people who might be too casual about the discussions around me that I lost my aunt that day. It seemed to work. Until Church . . . . .
The Priest announced that he was going to give the same homily he had given the Sunday of 9/11 10 years ago. I thought: "Oh no. This is going to get annoying." But, before I knew it, my eyes were brimming with tears. I left. I went outside and watched little butterflies sipping from the bougainvillea. But, in that quiet moment, I started thinking, for the first time since she died, about the 5 months when I lived with Rhonda and her family. I let myself remember conversations, impressions, fond moments. I thought about how 5 months is a significant amount of time to live with and interact with someone on a daily basis when you are 18. I thought about this being the reason that it's been hard for me to hear other people talking about 9/11 in a casual-I-remember-the-day manner.
Satisfied that I had taken my own little memorial moment, I went back into the church. Just in time for a list of names of the Orthodox Christians who had died on 9/11 to be read. And I was time-warped back to the moment I listened to the listing of the names of the 9/11 Victims for my aunt's name. I was brought back vividly to the moments when I listened for her name as proof that she existed and as some kind of validation to my loss. This time, I could hardly contain myself as I quickly left the church.
I found a spot between the cars where no one would find me in the parking lot and sobbed. Great loud sobs that had carried 10 years of unexpressed grief. I thought more about the way I had known my aunt because I had lived with her at such an important time in my personal development. I thought of the grief of my dad - she was his youngest sister. My grandmother - who is now gone. All of the people I could have grieved with, but I was too angry and confused. How I added to their loss by refusing to join with them in grief. How I caused myself to suffer more because I didn't join them.
I cried a long time. Until my nose was swollen and red. Until it didn't hurt quite as bad.
And later, I sent a text to my parents to tell them that I loved them and was thinking about them on this day. That I'm glad we still have each other.
Grief unexpressed for 10 years is too long.
Reflecting on that experience, I naturally began thinking about my grief unexpressed because of the loss of the belief system that had been such a huge part of my life as a Mormon. I had begun expressing it and exploring it on my blog. But then, my sister lashed out at me, saying I was "attacking" her because I was "attacking" her church. Mormons who lived local to my family began calling the local Mormon authorities, who called my parents to ask if they "knew what I was doing?"
So I stopped. Because I didn't want to hurt anyone.
But all of that unresolved grief about my Aunt Rhonda taught me something: It hurts too much to hold something in that I need to express.
And it only hurts people around me when I express my exploration and searching if they let it. I'm harming no one here. But, hopefully, this exploration will help me find what I'm looking for.
Believe me - if I could have easily stayed inside the Mormon Church in spite of what my guts were telling me, I would have. It would have been MUCH easier than what I'm doing now.
No, I didn't leave the Church to "justify my sins." Believe me, it would be easier to "repent" and seek "full fellowship" than to have to root-out erroneous beliefs and try to find what is Truth again.
I think I'm finding my path. And I won't apologize for doing it in public.
My aunt Rhonda taught me many things. And now, I can add a few more things to that list. Near the top of the list is that I will refuse to stifle myself for fear of how others might respond. 10 years is too long to refuse to acknowledge something that happened to change my life in an instant.
It's been 2 years since I left Mormonism. If I continue to stifle, I'll suffer for it the rest of my life. Lesson learned. I refuse to suffer in silence when my working through using my words is such a healthy process.
Amen. And, Amen.
Incessant Chatter
Another note: I posted this to my family members on FaceBook and within moments, I received communication from my cousin that Rhonda's husband - the father of her children - who was down the hall in his office when the plane hit the Pentagon on 9/11 died this morning. Complications of Diabetes. Seems, to me, that he never recovered from the loss we all feel when we think of our Beloved Rhonda.
Well spoken. You go girl!
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