How Do You Say Goodbye?

The girls are bathed and in bed. Tomorrow, they will put on their pretty dresses. At least one will ask for "fancy hair". Jerome will put on his suit and tie, I will wear a bright blue dress and the necklace I gave her last Christmas.

We will pick up the gorgeous floral arrangements that have been delivered in the last 8 days, and head to the church.

Has it really been 8 days?

I will arrange flowers, check with the tech guys, the musicians, our pastor.

I will try to keep myself busy right up to the last minute. I struggle to comprehend what we are truly doing tomorrow, and the tasks are so much easier to deal with than the emotions. The emotions bring tears, and heartache, and loss. And they hurt.

Because how do you say goodbye?

When there are no words

This post just won't come.  I've been trying to type it out, anything out, for two days.  Tonight, I told myself that I just had to do it.  Sit down and make myself.  So I did.  And then, just as I was finishing it up, the %$##@!*&* website decided to not save the post.  So I convinced myself that I didn't really need to write this, that it could wait another day or two.  Or a lifetime.

Sunday, April 28, 2013, at 9:52 AM, my world changed forever.  My 19 year old sister-in-love was gone.  A traumatic accident.  My sister-in-love is dead.  The hardest words I have ever written.  Or said.  Or thought.  But the more I put off writing this, the easier it is to pretend this isn't real.  That I'm not really trying to help coordinate a memorial service or meals.  That I'm not watching my in-laws age instantaneously.  That my husband isn't walking around in a daze.

Daytime is easier.  There are things that need to be done, arrangements that need to be made.  Phone calls.  Emails.  Texts.  If I focus on my list, I don't focus on the pain.

The night is different.  The night, after everyone else is sleeping, is my time to grieve.  To cry, to be mad, to mourn.  The night is when the pain becomes so very, very real.

I have known Celine since she was 2.  I asked her once - she did not remember life before me.  We have butted heads, argued, pestered, cried together, and loved.  She was the best little sister anyone could have ever prayed for.  And my heart aches for her.

I know she is whole now.  No more seizures.  No more pain.  No more tears.  No more heartache.  She is in the arms of Jesus, dancing and laughing, watching all the movies she never got to see and learning just how much her Heavenly Father treasures and adores her.

Tomorrow, there will be more decisions to be made, more papers, more phone calls.  But tonight, I can be by myself and struggle to comprehend this hole in my heart.

I love you, my sweet sister.