Chapter 19: Back to…Normal?

September 9, 2025

Well, all of the out of town guests have now left and we’re firmly back into the school year routine so…I guess it’s time to get back to work.  Back to “normal.”  Whatever that means from this point forward.

I’m not entirely sure what to do.  On the one hand, I know mom wouldn’t have wanted me to be miserable.  But, I’m also not sure what I’m supposed to do to grieve.  I’d like a book, please.  Is there an instruction manual on how to do this?  Sure, people have died before…but never my mother.  This is different.  And it’s not fair – there was no reason for this to happen.  She should still be here.  Am I still in shock?  I wonder how long that takes to wear off.  But I’m worried about what it’s going to feel like when I’m no longer numb.  I’m not sure I’m ready for whatever comes next.

There is still a lot of work to do in terms of helping dad with estate administration.  My goodness, I can’t believe how much paperwork is involved when someone dies.  And to think that mom is about as “simple” a case as you can ever get.  She had no independent assets – everything she had was shared with dad.  In fact, as things started to decline, we even got rid of her independent bank account. A sad reminder of how things ended, but I’m glad it’s a step dad took. All this to say, there are no real instructions from her will that need attending to since dad is still here and was the beneficiary of everything.  And we’ve pretty much dealt with her personal staff now. 

Still – there are so many government agencies to notify and other records to close down on the medical and – just general life side of things.  Over the past few visits to the house, I’ve been trying to deal with mom’s computer. I’ve saved some of her files for sentimental reasons, and downloaded her contacts, and unsubscribed her from the various mailing lists she was on. A depressing job to just confirm that she’s never going to sit at this machine again, but it needs to get done…and I didn’t want dad to have to deal with this. There are five messages in her inbox – all from my sister, so it makes me smile that she at least had those to look at every day.

Unfortunately, the only tangible outcome from all of this work is that I am now positively terrified for what will happen when it’s dad turn.  It’s a horrible thought but now that we’ve been confronted by this horrific reality, I suppose I have to start thinking about it.  I should probably talk to him about his will and all the rest of it.  Ugh.  Won’t that be a cheery conversation.  Please God don’t take him away from me anytime soon. 

I had a lot of meetings today including a first in-person meeting with a (hopefully) prospective client.  I even talked about mom (very generally, I didn’t say how recent it was) and I didn’t cry, so I suppose that’s…progress…?  It felt kind of good to get back into business clothes and have conversations not related to death.  But it also felt very weird to think that I’m just going about my day now…with mom not here.  And never coming back.

I’ve never been much of a mantra person, but I think “one day at a time” is going to be the new one.  I just can’t think beyond that at the moment…

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