the wes show

At first, I was anxious because I haven't heard back yet about the job that I so desperately want and need. At least, that's what made the most sense. I felt the cloud creeping in early in the morning and it settled, hovering over me around 4pm this afternoon. Funnily enough, another huge cloud is about to settle in, this one a much more literal version in the form of Hurricane Irene.

I don't think I'm going to die. I don't think it's going to be nearly as bad as everyone says it is. However, it's completely out of our hands. I don't see the point in worrying. Be prepared, and let Jesus take the wheel. What will be, will be.

I miss her so much. It's been nearly two months since I've spoken to her, heard her voice, and longer since I've seen her smile. Without a doubt the longest time I've gone without speaking to my mother. I thought it's what I had to do after so many years on the roller coaster. I began to feel nothing at the dips and nothing at the highs. No fear in the pit of my stomach, no joy escaping up through my lungs. I became numb. Is this what you do? Is this how you cope?

I feel things and I feel them strongly, so it's odd for me to be so readily anti-emotion and standoffish, especially with the woman who has been the apple of my eye for my entire life. It shocks my friends, undoubtedly worrying them. It doesn't make sense to strangers who can't grasp how anyone can get to the point where they don't feel anything - not hate, not love - for their mother. And everyone else who doesn't know just assumes that everything is okay.

On Monday, she will enter a rehab facility for the first time in her life to start a real recovery for her alcoholism. She has had her fair share of false starts: trying AA meetings, psychologists, outpatient programs, and even equine therapy. My mother hasn't been sober for more than 8 months in thirteen years.

I came inside my apartment this afternoon to escape the cloud. To hide from the scatter of New York City, which has an electrifying and ominous tension in the air, amplified by social media and flashlight sales on the sidewalks. It was quiet, warm, and I was alone. I just started crying. The kind of cry I felt at my grandfather's funeral when it hit me that he was gone, forever. My body weakened, my joints began to ache, and I felt something I haven't felt in so, so long.

I needed her. I needed her voice, her laugh, her very simple way of making me feel like everything is going to be okay. The way that no one else has ever been able to. I needed her to ask me how I am, to hear her care - something I've not only denied her, but myself.

I want to tell her how proud I am of her. I want to be brave for her because I know how scared she is. I wanted to tell her these things before all Hell breaks loose this weekend and who knows what happens to electricity or cell service. It was the thought of not being able to hear from her again - for another 28 days - that made me break.

Until this moment, I have tried to maintain control in a chaotic situation. I have held the reigns and kept her at a distance to protect myself and to hopefully catapult her into seeing the consequences of her actions. I did what I thought I needed to do. For her, I can only see two options: recovery or death. She will die, literally or metaphorically to me, if she does not get help. Or she will recover, and so will our relationship.

While this city of 8 million people goes mad trying to figure out how to cope with the uncertainty of a hurricane, I felt a sense of clarity. This is what it's like to love an alcoholic. You never know what will really happen. You have to do what you can do to prepare, and let the rest go. Some lives get ruined, some lives come out unscathed.

I just miss my mom. I want her back. I would stand in the middle of that storm and let it take me if it meant knowing that she would live the rest of her life fulfilled and happy.

But as we know, that's not how it works. What will be, will be.