I’ve had enough of death and depression lately, thank you, but apparently I am not on the steering committee that decides when these matters show up in my life to be paired with a tall glass of seltzer or, more likely, cabernet.

Death: two friends from college have each lost a parent in the last few weeks. Little Brother lost his preschool teacher.

Depression: see below.

Last Wednesday, I opened the fridge at LB’s school to place his lunch inside and was greeted by the sight of a simple carafe whose very presence was a punch in the gut. It was not so simple a carafe, see, because one week ago to the day I had been in that same kitchen, opened that same fridge, and seen that same carafe. That time, however, LB’s teacher was in the room with us and I paired a sideways glance with a knowing smirk, asking him, “Hey A, is that a carafe of rosé I see here?” He appeared confused for a second, then got on board with the joke as we speculated together over how necessary alcohol was on the job. A day later he was gone. A week after that day was his funeral, and I missed expressing sympathy and experiencing catharsis because LB was sick on the couch with a fever. So instead, I found time on my own to cry: on training hikes, in a swimming pool. I tried to cry and breathe my way through the loss of a person who loved my child, whose near-daily presence in our lives was now a hole, to say nothing of what his family is experiencing, of what all these families who are left with holes might be experiencing.

That alone would be enough for some sustained sadness. But depression isn’t “feeling sad.” It’s more insidious and less obvious, burrowing underneath the circumstances of daily life and waiting until things feel relatively calm and measured before pulling the rug out from underneath it all like some kind of asshole magician. To wit: there seems to be an annual pattern for its arrival. First there is the heat of the summer and what starts off as a blessed lack of schedule and excess of Vitamin D. Then the togetherness gets stifling and we’re all driving each other crazy. Then the anxiety about school sets in for the boys and me, schedules are readjusted, and newness is encountered. Then the season of adjustment appears to be completed, the boys are settled, and WHOOSH! Here comes that asshole magician to leave me in the depths without any explanation until I remember that it likes to wait until the overt anxiety has evaporated and I am left with the quiet I’d longed for over the summer that now either weighs down or isn’t enough. I’m overwhelmed by the little things–making lunches, being questioned about zombies, managing emotional moments at bedtime–while the big things stomp around, promising to go nowhere until they’re dealt with too.

Also, I have PMS and I forgot to wear deodorant today. And The Kid’s therapist is sick so I just negotiated a half-day at school followed by a trip to the toy shop. The Husband is at a work dinner tonight and LB cried at drop-off while the teachers urged me to leave and I did, feeling like a neglectful mother the whole way while also feeling relieved and feeling guilt about that.

It’s complicated! And I think that’s because it’s all connected. The sadness plays into the depression and the anxiety plays into the anger and a simple morning before school turns into a Greek tragedy leaving me in a whirlwind of emotion and regret.

Titanic was on TV the other night and I was reminded of a few things: The Sis saw it, like, seven times at the cinema; Rose as an older woman was a bit too sassy for my taste (THAT NECKLACE COULD HAVE FED A SMALL COUNTRY, ROSE); and it really wasn’t that great a flick. And yet the story never leaves, seared into our collective consciousness in its awfulness and unexpectedness, displayed so melodramatically (and with terrible dialogue) by the film. I remember learning about the disaster (the sinking, not the film) early in life and learning more about icebergs shortly after: how the visible part of them above water is actually just the beginning; how that part is dwarfed by what lurks beneath the surface, that mammoth hunk of ice beyond the naked eye.

There are those surprises we didn’t plan for, those piles or ice that pop up in our path and either divert us or wreak holes in our lives, and the thing about them is that on their own, on their surface, they’re enough to do serious and irreparable damage, but underneath? Underneath is another thing altogether. Underneath is what comes along with them, the days and years of grief and absence and gut-punches and tears, the thinking-you’re-okay-until-you’re-reminded-that-you’re-SO-not-and-you-may-never-really-be.

Yesterday when I picked LB up from school I was talking to a couple of his teachers (including A’s replacement, grrr) about hating to have missed the funeral. Then they both related to me–including A’s replacement, who was the one to see it while the other teacher was at the funeral–about how much A loved birds and knew all about their names and habits. And that on the day of the funeral, a particular owl that A knew of and liked appeared on a tree just outside the school’s doorway and stayed there from noon until everyone left for the day, well after three o’clock, its eyes wide open, staying fully awake the entire time.

Owls are nocturnal, you know.

“Now I don’t believe in reincarnation, but…” his teacher told me.

I don’t believe in reincarnation either. But I do believe in Jesus, which is convenient when you need to tell your kids about death because you can soften the blow by following up with details on heaven. But it’s quite inconvenient because of all the baggage that comes along with it, meaning that if I believe in Jesus, then I believe in a whole shitload of other crazy things: resurrection, virgin birth, forgiveness. I believe that an owl in a tree can be more than an owl in a tree. I believe in things that simply cannot be explained.

And I believe–because I have to, really, you see–that sometimes the iceberg doesn’t turn out to be an iceberg after all. Sometimes, because land also is not just a floating piece in the ocean but extends its mass beneath the water, sometimes the iceberg is actually a place to dock–or get shipwrecked, if you will, the boat that got you there a mangled mass on the shore–and plant your torn feet on the ground, look around, and see that everything being connected extends to everyone being that way too, and that sometimes what ends up surprising you most isn’t the shadow on the water ahead but the hands that hold you, the faces that show up, the faithfulness that hounds you, the grace, all around.