"We are made to persist. That's how we find out who we are."

- Tobias Wolff, In Pharaoh's Army

I’ve been in a terrible mood for the last couple of days. I’m stressed out in about every way I can imagine and it makes me feel totally shutdown and overwhelmed. (Like, “Gee, wouldn’t it be nice to sit in a room and make origami butterflies all day?” overwhelmed.)

Part of it is that I am obsessively checking my email, awaiting a response (even a negative one) from my first-choice agent. I sent a query (including synopsis and prologue) five weeks ago today. An exclusive query. I should have heard back within four weeks, according to this agency’s website. And, they invite people to inquire if they have not heard within the timeframe. Still, I don’t want to be annoying and so I’m going to give it until Monday before I check in again. (I’ve already got my second choice lined up if this one isn’t interested, so it’s not so much the fear of rejection that’s killing me. It’s the waiting. I hate waiting. I am not a patient girl.)

Earlier this month was the 18-monthiversary of Mom’s death. My shrink said that I wasn’t allowed to make any major life decisions for a year to a year and a half after Mom died, and I kind of get why now. At 18 months, I feel a lot different than I did even at one year. It’s like that quote from Dollhouse last year: “You never get over it. It just becomes part of you.” I’m certainly not over my mom’s death (or her illness or her permanent absence from my life), but being motherless is part of who I am now. It’s hard and it will always be hard, but it also just IS.

If it sounds like I’ve moved to some great enlightened place about all this, I haven’t. Last night, I posted the following status update on Facebook:

About nine kinds of overwhelmed right now and all I can think is, "I want my mommy." Which makes me really sad.

Several friends commented their commiseration. Sometimes, misery does love company, because it’s just NICE to know you aren’t alone. But, sometimes, it sucks to know that your friends are as sad as you.

My 16-and-a-half-year-old cat, Mazzy, is doing the thing she did starting last May through the fall where she cries and howls every couple of hours through the night. No particular reason that I can find. The white noise machine doesn’t drown her out. Closing the door doesn’t drown her out. Closing the door AND putting on the white noise machine doesn’t work. Yeah. It’s AWESOME.

In the wee hours of last night, she decided (after crying at me) that she wanted to climb up on the bed. (Yes, climb. She doesn’t jump like a normal cat.) Due to the craziness that is my luck, she hooked a claw into my cheek. (Go ahead and picture it and then laugh. An 8-pound black and white cat with one claw in my cheek, trying to climb up on the bed. Objectively, I can admit that the image must be pretty funny.) Thankfully, I wasn’t badly hurt and I didn’t get too much blood on the pillow case.

But, that’s the kind of couple days it’s been – just dreary weather and not enough sleep and anxiety about emails that haven’t arrived and tons going on at work and at home and not writing and and and and and.

Until I got home from work today.

I was surprised to find a greeting card in my mail. I opened it up, and my hand flew to my heart just as soon as I read the outside of the card: “My heart is grateful for you…”

The card was sent by Jackie (who has a track record for sending really amazing cards). It was a follow up to an email she sent me last week, thanking me for a CD I mailed her. It was a mix of music I’d listened to during my grieving process that I thought helped me. Her dad died shortly before Christmas and I wanted her to know I was thinking of her and I wanted the music to help bring her just some small measure of peace, if it could.

The inside message of the card is: “…and for all the many ways you make my world a better place.” Jackie replaced the word “my” with “the.”

And there’s the lesson once again: KEEP WORKING ON LOVE.

All I had to do was reach out and show the smallest bit of kindness to this person who means so much to me (Jackie is, unquestionably, one of my top five favorite people on the planet) and she reaches back. She shows me that no matter how overwhelmed I may feel, there are still incredible people in my life. Incredible people who appreciate me for who I am, as I am.

And why?

Because sometimes – just sometimes – I remember that lesson. I remember to tell people what I think of them. I remember to tell people that I think of them. I remember to show kindness and caring. I remember that love takes work, and I keep working at it.