Its Saturday today--which, in Dubai, is "Sunday". Sundays have always been the favorite day of the week for me.
When I was little, my family would wake up early Sunday morning to the smell of the bacon and eggs breakfast that my mother was cooking in the kitchen. My mother did this wonderful thing when we were little and woke us up with warm wash rags on our face and she would sing this cute little song every morning.
It was a nice way to wake up to say the least.
She would then shoo us to the table in our pajamas, all sleepy-eyed and not wanting to be there, until she would come around to hug us and set orange juice on the table.
We would all eat together and then she would clean up the table and begin dressing us for church--curling my sister's and my hair, combing my brothers, tying my dads tie for him.
After we were all dressed, I remember sitting on the edge of the bed in her and my dads room, and watching her get ready in the leftover 15 or so minutes we had before leaving for Sunday School.
She was always running late--and for good reason: she had fed, dressed and coifed three children and a husband--and she always did it to perfection, which took a lot of effort, patience and...time.
I would watch her scurry around, rolling her hair before ironing her dress. She had a very calculated method for putting the rollers in her hair: 4 medium sized ones would go down the middle of her head starting in the front, with two smaller sized ones on either side of the initial four. I still remember watching how she put each of them into her hair--sometimes digging into her scalp a little too far with the curler clip, which would make her wince a little from the pain, but she never made a sound of complaint. Next, she would iron her dress while waiting for the curlers to set her hair. She never wasted a minute.
After dressing and taking the curlers out of her hair, she would sit down to her make-up mirror--one of those "old school" kind with lights built into either side of it. You could even change the color settings on the lights to emulate night time lighting or day time lighting. I thought that was so neat.
I would sit behind her and watch the reflection of her in the mirror as she carefully concealed the barely noticeable red spots on her face and the small broken vessels that she claimed to have around her nose. She would then raise her eyebrows and move in closer to the mirror to put mascara onto the longest eyelashes I have ever seen in my life--her big blue eyes sparkling with the reflection of the mirrors light in them.
She would always say that if it took longer than 5 minutes to put on your make-up, you were putting too much on. I have never forgotten that.
Ever so often, she would catch me staring at her and she would stop mid-motion and look back to smile at me, and when she did her whole face would change. It was as if every other thought in the world had left her mind and all she saw in that moment was me. Her eyes would light up and soften at the same time--her forehead would lower, the corners of her mouth would extend out as far as they could raising her cheeks to make the ends of her eyes rise with them, and she would always tilt her head slightly and lower her shoulders as if looking at me washed all of her stress away.
When I saw her face like this, I never needed to hear "I love you", although those words and that look always went together. Reflexively, I would return the look to her and she would go back to her makeup.
Those moments when she looked at me like this were my favorite.
I would watch her carefully finish her makeup until the most beautiful creature I had ever seen would emerge--every Sunday morning. She was perfect to me. Not just on Sundays, but especially on Sundays. Something about taking care of us and getting us ready for church really made her happy...and it glowed out of her.
Today I woke up thinking about those Sundays.
Today, I had my first good cry over her being gone. It took two, nearly three months, but I finally had it. It's weird, but I think I had been waiting to get here to have it. Somehow I feel like I needed to save it for a time and place when I could really be alone and let it happen. I didn't have to worry about someone seeing or hearing me, or about someone being worried about me. I didn't want someone to hold me through it, or to tell me it would be ok. I didn't want to talk about it or have someone hand me tissue while telling me how I will always have her with me no matter what.
I needed to do it here where I could be this alone with it. So I did.
For more than three hours I cried until I thought it would be impossible for my body to produce any more saline, and then.....I just stopped. It felt like 500 pounds had been released from me.
I got up and went to the bathroom to wash my face. I turned the water on as cold as I could possibly get it and I put my hands under the water to wet the rag. With the rag opened, I draped it over my whole face. Sitting down next to the sink, I left it on my face until all of the cold had moved from the rag to my skin. It felt better than anything I've felt in a long time. It was so refreshing. I sat there thinking how much I wish I could see her look at me that way again.
As I stood in the mirror, removed the rag and used the corners of it to wash away the black tears from my face, I saw two big blue eyes sparkling back at me in the mirror. They were completely tear-stained, but they had such a familiar shape, size and color. They were a little red, but large like hers. The lashes were completely mascara free, but long and blonde like hers.
They were soft like hers....and they had a familiar look like hers.
In that moment, I may not have seen her mouth form the words, or been able to see her head tilt slighly when she said them, but I definitely heard a very fond "I love you".
And Sundays are still my favorite day of the week...
