I have been sleepwalking for a year, hoping for a miracle, hoping to wake up. When I talk to Chelsea, my message is always the same, "Cut it out! The joke is over; this isn't funny anymore. Get back here now, young lady, we're all waiting for you. Life isn't the same without you. I miss you. I love you." But, of course, she doesn't answer, and I fall to my knees. My one regret, the thing I'd give anything to change, is my wish that I'd pushed past the police officers and the firefighters, and pulled Chelsea from the flames in that awful warehouse. I would gratefully have exchanged my life for hers. Doesn't it make more sense for a talented daughter to write a song memorializing her mother, the hero who saved her life... than for a mother to sit and blankly ponder this twisted mistake? After Chelsea's death ~ as if by design ~ hurricanes, mass murder, frenzied hatred, and firestorms shook our world, blocking our way with blackened tree limbs and fallen rocks of sorrow. It felt as though everything, absolutely everything, was breaking apart. For me, it did.
Chelsea isn't coming back. My world has fallen. How can I deal with this?
My daughters are, and always have been, my teachers: Sabrina reminds me daily, through her example, that we have reserves of strength and grace within. This life without Chelsea is the shape of our lives to come. We step cautiously over the sad debris. Sometimes, we stop and rest. Sometimes, we fall. But Sabrina has found a way to clear her own path. She has grown, building an inspired life from the wreckage, and I must do the same. I will keep looking to Sabrina for the will to do good in the world, to love authentically and fully, to do the work I was meant to do. And I will become an evangelist for Chelsea's message of joyful acceptance and love. It's all a mother can do. It's all I can do. Peace to you all.
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