Switch Her Back On

Over spring break this year my husband and I took our two sons on a trip up the California coast.  

I loved watching my boys witness the beauty of the coast and play on the beaches that feel so different from the ones we enjoy in LA. My husband and I chatted as we drove- remembering all of the times we’d made the same drive over the last two decades. When we first started dating my mom lived in San Francisco. We remembered the times we went to visit her. Her short time in San Francisco represents the last real period of stability before she died by suicide. I’m not sure if she was sober while living there, but she seemed to have some hope for the new life she was building. She was taking art classes. She could see a future. It was the time before it all came crashing down for the last time. 

Photo by . c on Unsplash

We arrived in San Francisco and decided to take the boys to see a place my mom had introduced us to, The Fortune Cookie Factory, in Chinatown. I was surprised at how well my husband remembered the location and how to get there. He navigated through the alleys, encouraging all of us to keep climbing the gigantic hill that felt totally unfamiliar to me.  All I could latch onto was the memory of my mom next to me. My gaze, as always, turned to her instead of the world around me. 

We left The Fortune Cookie Factory with a bag full of chocolate dipped fortune cookies. My older son and my husband went into a nearby shop to get some boba while my 4 year old, Louie, and I sat on a bench, enjoying our treats.

“Louie, my mommy first took me to this spot,” I told him. “She would have loved to be here with you.”

“Where is your mommy, mommy?” my 4 year old asked.

“She’s dead sweetie,” I reminded him, “she died a long time ago.”

Words I’ve said so many times over the past 13 years. My mom. She’s dead. She died. A long time ago. 

My son looked up at me and frowned a little as he instructed, “so switch her back on.”  

I looked from Louie to the street, decorated with bright red lanterns. His instructions so clear and his mind so believing that for a moment it felt like I could. 

Switch her back on…

I switch her back on and she walks towards us, a bounce in her step and that twinkle in her eye. She is on the boys level immediately, kissing their faces. She holds their hands as she shows them the beauty of the place we’re in, pointing out so many things none of us had seen. We walk around the city. She buys each of them the perfect gift, something they’ve wanted and no one else had heard of or would be able to find. She wraps her arm around my waist as we trail behind the boys. She tells me how my children remind her of me when I was a girl. I lean my head against hers. I look at her brown eyes and know they’re an exact mirror of mine. She tells me I’m a good mom, that the boys are growing so beautifully. She tells me how proud she is of me. 

Switch her back on…

I switch her back on and she walks towards us. My throat closes. All of my senses are tuned in to her. She stumbles and my hand goes in front of my sons as if they’re passengers in my car and I’ve hit the breaks too quickly. I brace for impact and force my senses to shut down. I scan her from head to toe, observing the state of her hair, the rhythm of her blinking, the color of her cheeks and the cleanliness of her clothes. I run through all of the excuses in my head of why we need to leave. I can’t remember who I am. I want to run, but my feet are glued to the ground, abandoning myself again and again and again and again. I remember how it felt to watch my mother turn into a shell of herself around her mother and I know the pattern is continuing with me. 

Switch her back on…

“I tried, my love.” 

My whole life was dedicated to the pursuit. If I could just be a good enough daughter, if I could just make her feel like a good enough mother. If I could figure out the source of her agony. If I could find the right treatment.

If I had seen the signs. If I had told someone what was happening. 

If I had picked up the phone that night.

I curl my fingers around my sons’ hands as my spirit wraps around the sadness that never quite goes away. My parents are dead. The opportunity to change them is over, but so is the abuse. 

I put one foot in front of the other on the long path to changing the legacy of hurt. I keep my hope switched on so that I can continue to protect theirs so fiercely. I look at their lives and remind myself that we are here. That we are alive.

We are switched on.