Empty Chair Graduate

 There were no invites. There has been no scolding regarding the 8th grade cap and gown that you need to hang up to avoid wrinkles. There was no last minute trip for a dress shirt that fits. We won't dress up and cram our exceptionally large family into an uncomfortable pew. There will be no moving of a tassel from right to left. 

But there will be an empty chair. 

They'll display your chair. It's a chair for a toddler who never got to require something bigger to hold him. Your big brother's bookbag will sit in it signifying something I needed to see. Signifying what, I don't know. Why does it need to be there? I honestly don't know. It just does. I need for the emptiness to be acknowledged, even when I won't be there to see it. You won't be there. I won't be there. But it will be, and that will have to be enough. 

The familiar burn in my chest has been there in all its cruelty and comfort. It's you. My connection to you. I hate it and need it. It takes my breath and gives you life. I can walk and talk and even smile through it. But it's there. It's heavy and makes everything slow. I remember the first time I had to don a lead apron again at work after you'd gone. I thought "that's it. This is exactly the heaviness I feel when grief is loud." But I can't take this heaviness off and hang it back up. I just keep carrying it, through work, through talking, through smiling. Can others not see it? I can't believe they can't see something that causes so much pressure, but they can't. If they could see it they'd ask why I was carrying such weight. They'd want to know why I didn't just lay it down. You and I know that can't be done. It must be carried. It cannot be ignored by the wearer. At some point it will be acknowledged and given credit for its immense weight. 

I spent an incredible amount of time today wondering what favorite restaurant you would have chosen as your 8th grade graduation meal tonight? I laughed when your big brother had his choice of anyplace he wanted and we all huddled around tall tables at Jimmy John's. I'm almost certain we'd have a main dish of ice cream tonight if you were to decide. Maybe if grief allows me to eat later, I will make that my dinner. 

That chair. Instead of registering you for high school with your classmates, I sent a message requesting that one of the freshman teachers please allow me to set your chair in their room for the year. That's not how this was supposed to go. I wasn't supposed to feel so heavy, to be walking through air that feels like deep water. I'm not supposed to be lying next to your garden, listening to my coveted "pain playlist" and writing to you in this way. That chair shouldn't exist. A smelly, curly-headed, goofy boy should be in its place. What I wouldn't give to see that boy/young man today. 

I can't watch them walk down that aisle. I can't listen to their names being read from a podium. I can't sit there and know that I won't see your face in that sea of classmates you never met. There will be no Mom. There will be no sisters and no brother. No grandpa and grandma. No aunts, uncles or cousins...

But, there will be a chair.