Originally Published November 16, 2023
Dear Mom,
49 days without you here.
I wish I could say it’s getting easier.
It’s not.
But it’s getting more familiar.
And that makes me both glad and horrifically sad.
I wanted to tell you though, that Grumpy Bear is home.
Probably, you already know.
Grumpy Bear—the stuffed animal Olivia gave you last year, when she got to buy a prize for good behavior. She instructed you to sleep with him every night. And like the good Grammy you were (are), you dutifully promised you would.
And so, there Grumpy Bear sat, a prominent feature in your otherwise meticulous bedroom, day in and out.
Until the morning after you died, when Olivia and I surveyed your heartbreakingly empty bed and realized he was gone, too.
“I have bad news,” Dad told me quietly, when Olivia asked where he was. “Mom gave him to Margo.”
Margo, your dear friend, who’d been in the hospital. Dad said you’d brought Grumpy Bear to visit Margo, a move Dad later confessed to thinking of as “a bit strange.”
But you told Margo, “I’ll get him back the next time we see each other.”
You didn’t know it, then.
None of us did.
But a few days later, Margo would tragically die.
And seven days after, you would, too.
And in this life, you would never see each other again.
It appeared Grumpy Bear was gone with both of you.
***
Two weeks after you died, we went on our first extended-family outing to Dave and Buster’s.
I walked around thinking how strange it was that only living people could go to malls. Could go to arcades. Could play video games and eat snacks and laugh. I was missing you, and your aliveness, so much.
As the kids went to claim their prizes, I lost my breath upon seeing that one of the offered rewards was none other than Grumpy Bear.
Not our Grumpy Bear but a Grumpy Bear, none-the-less.
A million possible stuffed animals, but this one was here.
And I knew it was you.
Saying hi.
Saying it was okay, that somehow, I was living and you were not.
***
We got our Grumpy Bear back last weekend, when Dad and I went to pay tribute to Margo’s amazing life.
And Mom, I know this is crazy.
But as Julie handed me Grumpy Bear, that silly blue stuffed animal, I felt like I was getting back a piece of you.
When I got home, I returned him to an overjoyed Olivia.
But after seeing the tears in my own eyes, she said, “Mom, I have enough stuffed animals. You should keep him, instead.”
And in that moment, I realized her spirit and yours are one in the same.
Endless kindness.
Such striking generosity.
And so, Mom, Grumpy Bear now lives in my bed.
He is not you.
But I hug him and love him like he is.
And I hope whenever you are, you and Margo are smiling.
Together.
At peace.
And happy.
I love you, Mom.
Thanks for bringing Grumpy Bear home.
