Peace On Earth

Over the course of a birthday and Mother’s Day last year, I received two orchids as gifts. They both came from Trader Joe’s, and when their blooms fell off and never came back, I thought they should get pitched. Mark thought differently. One time while we were working in the yard, he told me that it must be really hard for a seed to grow and to become a plant, how much work it must take for a plant to come through the dirt and into the air. This was when we were arguing whether something was a weed (my opinion) or a plant (his opinion). After that discussion, I knew that if I wanted to dig something up out of my garden that it would be best to do it when he wasn’t around lest he got all existential on me. So you can imagine the horror he felt about my idea to throw out these living but not blooming orchids. “Step aside, Plant Killer,” he said to me, “I’ve got this.” Got it he did. Slowly he would pour room temperature water into their dirt and told me not to dump my ice cubes into them like I did the other plants. Too cold and no direct sun, he would say to me, it’s a shock to their fragile system.

My fragile system since Mark died would like this month to be over. If I could pull the covers over my head and sleep until January 2nd it would be a much needed gift. I am so tired. Tired of figuring things out, tired from crying, tired from the questions and the what ifs and the if only, worn out from sleep that escapes me too many nights.

But tis the season where a baby that was born in a stable and who would grow up to be a savior is the oldest and most repeated story many of us have heard throughout our life. And whether you believe it or not, there is no more perfect symbol of hope than a baby. Despite the pain of the last few months where the absence of Mark looms large and constant, there is a baby in this family now and he innocently fills much of that void. I look at him and wonder if he’ll love the outdoors as much as his grandfather, if he’ll grow up and one day look at a plant in my garden and wonder how it got there, whether he’ll find sweet freedom the minute he masters two wheels on his bike, will an interest in science become a lifelong passion? Who will this baby grow up to be?

About a month after Mark died I knocked over one of those precious baby orchids of his and decided to pitch it – out of frustration, anger and sadness. I thought about throwing the other one out as well and it was only guilt that changed my mind. A few weeks ago it bloomed and that delicate flower has clung to its stem with all its might. It’s as if every day it’s saying to me, “Lookie here, oh ye of little faith. I am here, I am still alive, I am in the air.” Surely that’s a sign, people tend to say, and I know they mean well but it’s a poor replacement for Mark Fisher.

But in all its tender glory, like the story of a baby boy born in Bethlehem and a baby boy born in Kansas City to my daughter and her husband, it is life…..and even in the fog of loss and fatigue I know that hope is winking at me just like that husband of mine did a thousand times.