7 years ago, Cal (6 at the time) came downstairs on January 14th, spread his arms out wide and bellowed, “Happy Calvin Eve everybody!”
At that point there was no denying the boy is mine.
That, my friends, was the birth of the birthday-eve celebration. For the rest of us, the birthday-eve has continued to be the main event; for Cal… not so much. He got one more carefree, untainted Calvin Eve to celebrate and then the unthinkable happened…
On Calvin Eve 2012 my dad sat in our living room , with me and Dan at his side, and told the kids that their Lalee was gone; she had passed away earlier in the day. And just like that, Calvin Eve became a day of sadness…
It’s just a gut-wrenching chapter in the most beautiful, innocent love story ever written…
My mother lived for my kids; they were the first unconditional love she ever knew. And it was mutual; I would be doing a disservice to their bond if I tried to put it into words. And when it came time to order her headstone I knew it had to pay homage to that love affair; and to that end, dad and I decided to have a picture of the kids etched into the stone. It’s perfect.
Incidentally, the delivery of her headstone is quite an interesting side story….
When dad and I ordered the stone we asked to have ‘Lalee’ and ‘Poppa’ inscribed below their names; very few people called my parents Dan and Eileen at that point – they were very simply, Lalee and Poppa.
About a month after we ordered the stone dad stopped by to show me the proof and what immediately struck me was – they are Lalee and Poppa and that’s what needed to standout on that headstone; it was lost in the small print under their names. Dad handed me the paper, I looked it over and said, “I’d like to change something.” Dad was not handling any of it well at that point and said, “It’s done. I don’t feel like discussing it,” and he walked out.
Six weeks later dad called to say the stone was never ordered; he was angry (understandably) and again, not receptive to my request for a change. “Dad, does this mean we have time to change…”
“Karen, we aren’t changing it.”
About 5 weeks later dad stopped by to chat, “You aren’t going to believe this but as they were loading your mom’s stone onto the freight liner, it broke right down the middle… it’s going to be at least another 6 weeks.” Dad just shook his head in disbelief, I took a deep breath, steadied myself and said, “Dad, I swear mom is unhappy with her inscription. I know you don’t like to think about it but her name isn’t right, Lalee needs to be bigger than Grace Eileen…”
“Call them and make it what you want Kar.”
And that is how my mother made sure her headstone was right.
Back to Cal and Lalee… now, there’s no denying my mom loved her granddaughters. No granddaughter was cherished more than Alexandra; she was the first and she was the apple of mom’s eye and Abigail… well, that little girl found her calm with mom; it was mom that taught me to embrace Abby’s spunk.
But Cal was different. He was so in love with his Lalee and she loved him unabashedly. When he was in kindergarten he bought her an engagement ring from Santa’s Workshop; he was so embarrassed to give it to her but my God you should’ve seen his face light up when she unwrapped that gift Christmas morning and slid that ring on her finger… the ring rests on her finger to this day…
Mom was adamant that the kids were not to see her sick. Well, she was sick for 104 days and there was no way I could (or would) keep them from her; I promised to honor all of her wishes, but that was one I just couldn’t follow through on. On her birthday, 6 days before we lost her, the kids asked to see her; she was unable to speak at that point but feverishly shook her head no when I told her the kids wanted to see her. They came up to her bedroom before I could stop them and the look she gave me will be forever etched in my memory; she was so angry with me. Mom didn’t look like herself, the meds had caused facial swelling, so Abby stood back, afraid. Alex walked up to her and gave her a quick hug and told her she loved her. And then Cal walked up to her…
That little 7-year old boy threw himself into her and hugged her with his entire soul. She laid her cheek upon his head and the most peaceful, serene look overtook the face that had shown nothing but pain and stress for weeks. Their love filled the entire room, the entire house… it transcended earthly concepts.
That was the last time my babies saw their Lalee…
And that was the week Calvin Eve ceased to exist.
Today it’s 6 years later and as they say, time has a way of blunting the pain. Throughout the day there’ve been tears and memories shared but we also decided to give the day back to Cal; Lalee would certainly want that.
Yesterday, Cal had mentioned ice skating – so off we went this afternoon. I took skates along with absolutely no intention of putting those bastards on my feet; by God I even carried them into the rink – yeah… I made a show of it. At the last minute I “decided there was too many skaters on the ice for somebody of my limited ability.” They fell for it. Suckaaaahhhs.
Then we stopped for some dinner. Between skating and dinner I asked Cal if he planned to look at my C-section scar tomorrow because, after all, it was having a birthday, too; he said, “uh no, I think I’ll pass… but Abby should have to do it, since she used it last.”
During dinner Cal asked Dan what time he had to leave for work and asked if I planned to swim tomorrow morning; he then informed his sisters that they’d have to get up early – he wants the whole family to gather in a circle and all at once do this growl/grunt/bark thing he does. I can’t believe that we not only agreed to it, but are kinda looking forward to it.
We stopped at the store for an ice cream cake (back to questioning his parentage… the kid doesn’t like regular cake!?!?!?! I got nothin’). And then we made one last stop…
This beautiful, beautiful boy asked me earlier in the week, “Mom… on our way to dinner Sunday… can we stop and visit Lalee?”