The leaves and the music and the UFOs.

My mom is dying. Literally dying.

My mom is dying of metastatic breast cancer that has spread to her brain.

My mom is dying. We have known this for over a month now. Christmas brought with it the news of two tumors staring back from an x-ray, uninvited among the wrapping paper and leftovers.

My mom is dying, and I am not. I always assumed that when the mutant cells in my mom's body finally caught up with her my only option would be to wave the white flag as well. I assumed that life without my mom was an impossibility. I imagined what it would look like. I tried to imagine who I would call on the phone. I wondered who would eat lunch with me on a Wednesday afternoon. Who would gush over pictures of Owen. Who would go with me to Target. Who would be my mom. There was no answer to those questions, so I assumed life without my mom wouldn't ever actually unfold. I was wrong.

My mom is dying. She is at the hospital, but not to be cared for. We have stopped fighting the cancer. We have given up. We have let them win. I support the decision to quit. However, if my mom was in her right mind, she would never be okay with this. She would sign up for the next dose of chemo. She would demand her doctor make a new plan. She would assure those around her, "I'll be okay." This is why I admire my mom - the woman without an ounce of quit in her. She outran the rest of us. I knew she would.

My mom is dying. For the past week she has slept more than not. She has existed somewhere in the fog of life with a tumor pressing on your brain. I have sat beside her bedside. I have watched her chest rise and fall. I have counted breaths. I have stared at her thin skin wondering if the cancer is right below the surface. Is it close enough to see? Is there anyway I could hold it accountable for what its done to my mom? Does it know who she is? It must not.

My mom is dying. I left the hospital tonight to drive home. I was alone. No Cody. No Owen. I drove the long way to my house through streets I have driven for years. I listened to the same music I listened to in high school when my mom again had cancer, but was not dying. I turned left. Right. I went through traffic lights. I sped up. I slowed down. Leaves scurried across the road as the wind blew too hard for February. It struck me that it is Groundhog Day. I laughed at the thought that cancer has sort of been our Groundhog Day. We've done this before. We've watched these scenes scroll across our screens for many years. Cancer has been on repeat for too long in our lives.

My mom is dying. On the way home from the hospital tonight I thought I saw a UFO. Weird lights in the dark sky hovered overhead. They didn't move much. They just floated. I followed them as the road allowed, turning through a neighborhood I had never been in before. I craned my neck to look at something that I knew wasn't real, my heart quickening with the realness of the floating lights. I realized that aliens can exist in a world without my mom. Why not? What else will float in the sky once my mom is gone?

My mom is dying. She is dying when I wake up. She is dying when I go to bed. She is dying when I refresh Twitter. She is dying when I change a diaper. She is dying when I do dishes. She is dying when I sit in her chair. She is dying when it's cold outside. She is dying when it's warm. She is dying when I hold my baby. She is dying with every rise and fall of her chest. She is dying at night in my car with the leaves and the music and the UFOs.

My mom is dying. And I am not. Somehow I am not.