The realities of grief hit at the most unexpected moments.

Many years ago when my stepfather died, I watched my mother go through the different stages of grief. I yearned to help her through it as she seemed so fragile, but I knew it was something she would have to deal with on her own terms. Over time, I believed she was doing quite well until the day I found her sitting in the floor cradling a beach ball and crying her heart out. Her grief overwhelmed her but I couldn’t understand the connection with the beach ball.

My mother and stepfather were both photographers and this beach ball was just an ordinary prop used to entice children to smile and to liven up a photo shoot. Suddenly it had brought my mother to her knees in tears and I couldn’t begin to understand. It’s just a beach ball!

When her tears subsided enough so that she could speak, she exclaimed, “It has Tom’s breath inside!”

She wanted to clean out the props in the studio and started to toss it aside when she suddenly remembered the day he blew it up, one breath at a time. Now, it seemed to her that the beach ball was the last thing she possessed to prove his life truly existed.

I held her awhile, but I never fully understood her pain. Not until after she died and I began going through the grief process for myself. No, I didn’t have a beach ball to contend with, and I managed to handle myself fairly well as I went through all of her belongings and took care of her affairs. My shock came when I heard my son’s voice as he cried out on the answering machine, “Call me back Mom, and please change that message.”

I had completely forgotten that Mother had put the announcement message on the recorder, and when my son phoned and got the recording of her voice, he broke into tears.

It seems like I stared at that stupid machine for hours before I had the courage to hit the “play announcement” button. My first reaction when her voice said, “I’m sorry I can’t come to the phone right now,” was “DUH!”

Then the tears came. I couldn’t make myself erase her voice.

And that’s when I fully understood about the beach ball. No, I never could erase her voice, but I did eventually quit playing it over and over again. At least when we had the power outage and the digital message deleted itself.

Grief comes in all shapes and sizes. Hers was in a beach ball. Mine was on the answering machine.