The Spring Line

The week after Christen passed away, a few people asked about when I was planning on going through her clothes and packing them up/giving them away. When my grandmother passed away several years ago, my grandfather went through her things within the first few days. His logic: If I don't do it now, I'm never going to do it. That's reasonable.

I, however, chose to wait. This was in part because I couldn't bring myself to do it right then. The previous two weeks had been a whirlwind of shock, pain, grief, processing, details, emotional ups and (mostly) downs, family, travel, and on and on. I just could not bring myself to go through Christen's clothing after all of that. Besides, a lot of her clothes were in our storage closet because she was wise to store our Spring/Summer wardrobe somewhere other than in our limited closet space (it is Chicago, after all). I was not going to try to bring all that up in the middle of January only to effectively take it all back down again, then bring it up for me and the kids again in Spring. I figured, when it's time to bring out the Spring clothes, I'll go through her stuff then.

That day was today.

To understand this moment, you have to understand who Christen was when it came to fashion. While I am no great fashion-monger myself, I did learn a few things in being her husband. Namely: Her style was her own. This is something that I always loved about her. She did not mimic other people. She did not stalk celebrity styles to do what 'they' were doing (these principles also applied to her hair). She found a way to be ahead of the curve without really paying attention to magazines, tabloids, fashion gurus, and the like. We don't have cable, so even shows like 'What Not to Wear' (which she loved) were unavailable. Consequently, she made up her own style. Everything from her color combinations to layers to textures to accessories were uniquely Christen. I can't begin to tell you how many times I heard women in the church comment, 'I love what you're wearing, but I could never pull it off,' to Christen. As her husband - beaming! I mean, come on guys, admit it: Being married to an 'it' girl is pretty sweet. After all, she said 'yes' to me - amazing!

I also loved her approach to shopping. She would go to a store with something very specific in mind. I would think, 'Oh, she's seen that in a catalog somewhere,' or some such nonsense. After looking around for awhile, she would very often just be done and ready to leave. Sure, she'd have picked up a couple of items, walked around with them, perhaps even tried them on. In the end, if it wasn't exactly what she'd pictured in her mind, it would go back on the rack. She did this all the time. I would ask her about it. Her response: 'I saw it in my head, and I figure it has to be out there somewhere. So I'll look until I find it.' Very often she would find it - a year later when the fashion world had caught up to my wife's brain.

I wouldn't say that fashion was something Christen spent a lot of time thinking about (after all, her word for all the material stuff of this life was kindling); she did, however, have exceptional taste, class, style, and timing. She managed to do something that most women scoff at - she made modesty trendy.

This brings us to this afternoon. I brought up the bins from storage, pulled out my clothes as well as the kids', and then got to the task of emptying out all of her clothes. The living room was covered by the time I was finished emptying all the bins, under-the-bed storage, and the closet.

I went through each item because I wanted to remember. At some items I laughed ('how did she ever make that work?'). At others I smiled ('she wore that all the time'). A few I simply broke down and wept uncontrollably ('I remember the last time she wore this' or 'she wore this on our anniversary').

At one point I found a sweatshirt that Christen used to wear around the house all the time. Gray and white striped, zip-up hoodie made of waffley cotton material. It had been tossed behind something in the closet, so it hadn't been washed since the last time she'd worn it. It still smelled like her. And I lost it. Hudson was in the room for that one. He came over, and at first he laughed because he thought I was playing some sort of game. In fact, he asked if I was playing. I told him I was not, and that I missed Mommy very much. He just stared at me with such compassion on his face, he looked 23 instead of 3. Then he hugged me. I told him I loved him, and he said he loved me too. I told him I loved Mama, and he told me she loved me too. It was the most excruciating and sweetest moment of the entire day.

I am emotionally exhausted as I type this. This day has been circled on my calendar, so to speak, since Christen's passing. In going through this process, I knew part of it would be remembering her as she was when she wore this outfit, that dress, those skirts, and so on. It would mean dealing with the fact that she would never fill those clothes again. It would mean touching the cloth that used to touch her skin, knowing that neither it nor I would ever do so again. The clothes by themselves are nothing. But clothes have memories, and I heard each one of them today.

I wish I could type something inspiring at this point in the post. I praise God that His mercies are new in the morning because I'm ready to go to bed and wake up to that. The truth is that today was one of the most emotionally taxing days I have had since her funeral. The point of today was not to see how far I've come in my grieving. The point of today was not to gauge my emotional readiness for this or that. The point of today was to get through today. To do this next hard thing. To embrace what was and accept, in increasing measure, that it isn't anymore. To let my kids know that it's okay for them to still miss Mommy. To weep openly. To say goodbye, again.