The secret life of Adelaide Grace
Next Tuesday, October 12th, will be two years without Adelaide. Even though I’ve lived this anniversary once before and keep reminding myself that the anticipation of the day is far worse than the day itself, it still sucks harder than a freshly cleaned Hoover. She wasn’t even four when she died so we have now spent half her life’s worth of time without her. For some reason that concept has had me solidly hung up for a few days now. This reality of how short her life really was. How one day we will have been without her longer than we will have been with her. I hate that.
Another thing I hate: I’ve happily told stories of our life with her over and over, but in doing so these memories have started to feel a little less real, a little more like it all happened to someone else. Now, I watch videos of her and look at photos incessantly to remember what she felt like in my arms, the way she would look at me or the noises she would make. It’s only been two years but already some of the more everyday moments are starting to get a little fuzzy around the edges. They are easily revived with a quick scroll through my phone’s camera roll but what didn’t I capture that will forever be lost to recesses of my memory? I miss her.
And then there are the realizations that take me by surprise in a good way. I was talking with Adelaide’s Nurse A last week. I’m not sure how the topic came up, but I mentioned to her that I still had Adelaide’s ashes in a box on my desk. Which is weird, I know, but we weren’t going to bury her in Chicago when we knew we were moving and even though she was born here in Jersey it doesn’t necessarily feel like her home. So she sits there on my desk in the room that we share and I think she would like it there. Great sunlight, ladybugs on the walls and her favorite books on the shelf. I know I like her being there with me - so for now it works. It will work until it doesn’t.
Anyway, I was telling Nurse A that I wasn’t sure what we were going to do with the ashes and she mentioned that she could think of a few places Adelaide liked. Which admittedly took me back for a moment, mostly because I rarely talk about Adelaide with someone who knew Adelaide as well as I did (aside from Miguel, of course). But Nurse A spent nearly five days a week with her for over a year - if anyone knew her as well as me it was her. But then she surprised me again when she mentioned that one of the places Adelaide loved was the 606 in Chicago. The 606 is an elevated, outdoor walking/running path - kind of like The Highline in NYC but less commercialized. One of the entrance ramps wasn’t far from our house, but for some reason we rarely went. For some reason likely being that the thought of chasing Jackson on his scooter while pushing Adelaide by myself because Miguel was working made my chest heave just thinking about it. I knew that Nurse A and Adelaide had taken daily walks in the neighborhood but I never asked where they went because, honestly, how far could they go. Also, cellphones. So it was new to me to hear that they had regularly walked the 606, that this was a place that Adelaide would recognize. Two years later and I was learning something new about my own daughter.
Once I got over the shock of it, I smiled.
The more I think about it the more I love that Adelaide had this private life that I didn’t know about it. I mean, how normal! Jackson has his life at school to which I am not privy, Miguel has his life at the theater. And here Adelaide had her own life apart from me as well. As she should. The secret life of Adelaide Grace.
