the path to enlightenment is paved with tears

Or at least my path is.  My former mother-in-law asked me to meet her for lunch.  I'm excited and terrified to see her again.  I love and miss her so much, but I know it will be painful.  And there will be crying involved.  On my part.

I held off seeing her for months to give myself time to heal, but now I think I'm not healing properly by staying in denial.  I still don't think I'm ready to hang out all the time, but I'm hopeful I can manage lunch.  Or dinner as it turned into.  Lunch was just too tricksy to coordinate with both of us working.

I'm extremely nervous so I'm not posting this until it becomes fait accompli.  We're meeting at a French restaurant, so I'm practicing my prodigious French vocabulary  -- all three phrases.  You'll get all of the nervousness and anticipation with none of the wait, plus immediate gratification of how it turned out.  You're welcome.

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Dinner was fun and delicious.  I forgot how much I like her company.  We went a bit early for Europeans, so we had the restaurant to ourselves for a while.  Until the loud Americans showed up.  The owner and the waitress both remembered me from at least a year ago.  It was the hair.  They said so.  I could shave my head and disappear in plain sight.  But I digress.

We caught up with life's news, although I didn't go into much detail into how hard it's been for me, because what's the point.  I kept it fairly light and cheerful, despite my burgeoning migraine.  I took only one Excedrin before I left home because I wanted to be able to drive.  That took a little of the edge off, but it started hitting pretty hard as we were wrapping things up.  Getting a little teary-eyed probably didn't help matters.  Mostly it was the storm-front blowing in that triggered this migraine, probably with a healthy side of anxiety thrown in.

I've really missed her level-headed perspective.  She's one of the closest people to enlightenment I know.  She's taught me so much over the years, how to better control my emotions or at least to realize it was in the realm of my possibilities.  She is tiny and one of the strongest women I know.  She has shown me time after time how to persevere in the face of adversity.

I made it almost all of the way home before the wracking sobs hit me.  Once I got home, I took more potent migraine meds, snuggled the cat, got the ice pack, and went to bed.  And slept eight glorious hours.

Today is gray and misty.  I like to think the heavens are respecting my lamentable mood; giving me a moment to reflect before telling me to pick myself up and stop feeling sorry for myself.  She's only out of my life as much as I choose to push her.  She asked that we make this a monthly occurrence.  I'll take one day at a time and see how I do.