A Natalie Observed

Tag: ARealPain

  • 11:11

    11:11

    One year ago, I arrived at the hospital for rounds anticipating guidance on removing your life support. The medical team informed us the day before tests confirmed you were not responsive. Your brain did not register any of the pain you definitely should have been in. I already knew. I knew when the neurosurgeon named Natalia told me on November 9th to keep hope up, to talk to you and play music. She told me we never know what kind of healing the brain can do and while I knew she was right, I knew you were not coming back. You did not have it in you to heal from this. We did not know how long you did not have oxygen when I started CPR. She introduced herself as Natalia when I arrived at your room. I remember because I tried to address her by title, as Doctor, but she corrected me. “I’m Natalia”. She’s the only name I remember from that week because her name was close to mine. She asked if she could hug me before leaving. I said yes and she gave me a strong, sturdy, caring hug. I played Reggae Saturday on KEXP because you loved Reggae Saturday. That’s what we would have listened to. I held your hand. I told you I loved you and that it was okay to move forward. I am realizing now you were the first of two people I have told this year it was okay to move beyond this life to whatever is next. The second was Grammy.

    After Natalia hugged me and left, I sat in the room listening to Reggae Saturday with you alone for a couple hours before others arrived. I do not remember who came or when. I know your sister was there and your brother. Your dad and his partner. My parents were making separate journeys from Chico. I had not slept while staying at Adam and Randy’s. I lay awake and cried, in shock. I got to your hospital room by 6:30am. Dottie was staying with Adam and Randy because I could not leave her alone. I sat on the sofa in your room and focused on breathing. Inhale, 1-2-3-4. Hold, 1-2-3-4. Exhale, 1-2-3-4. Even today when I have box breath like that to help my body settle, I remember sitting in that room on the pleather sofa that was easy to clean. I remember looking at lifeless you and out the window at the oranges and yellows of fall. I remember the beeping as they tried to thin your blood. The machine did not work and the nurse was so kind as she overly explained that “this happens sometimes”.

    I was hugged by your neurosurgeon on November 9th. On November 10th, we learned your brain was unresponsive. That you felt no pain. My mom and I walked to your room and a doctor asked to speak with me in a quiet room down the hall. I knew she was going to tell me you were not responsive and actively thought “remember this hallway Natalie, it’s going to change you.” I remember the wall of professional photos of the medical team. I wondered who the interior designer was of a hospital and how did they get that job. As the doctor told me, a conversation I cannot remember, a woman walked in on her phone seemingly unaware I was learning you died. That woman was probably stuck in her own nightmare. Not getting the hint from the palpable despair in the space, the doctor who told me you were brain dead asked her to leave. The woman startled, apologizing for intruding. My mom held me as I wept. We went home. There was nothing left to do. I told Facebook you were not going to wake up and the first of many panic attacks gripped me. Sitting on our sofa in our home, I lost my breath and hyperventilated as I attempted to touch the reality of you dying. The same reality I still struggle to touch. The energy of trauma is other-worldly and powerful. No wonder it splits us.

    On November 11th, I arrived at the hospital a little late for morning rounds. My parents were with me, and I think I asked them to stay in the family waiting area until I knew what was happening, although I cannot remember. I did not want to crowd your room and we were only allowed so many people. The medical team stood lining the hallway and I parted the members of your family blocking the entrance to your room so I could set down my water bottle and jacket. Was it raining outside? Or was it sunny? I think it was gray? So many details I cannot remember. I squeezed your hand and told you hello. Your eyes were half open, the sparkle no longer adorning the cerulean anymore. There was a thin layer of white crust under your eye lashes as your eyes attempted to keep moisture in them. I grabbed a tissue and wiped it away. I tucked your hair behind your ears. I joined your family in the doorway to your room and tried to understand what the medical team was talking about. They gave updates about your nutrition and fluid intake.

    I think it was on the 11th, although I cannot remember exactly what happened and when, that your sister said the quiet part out loud on behalf of all of us: why are we gathering to discuss your nutrition and fluid levels when your brain died? I did not understand what we were doing at Morning Rounds and was so grateful when your sister interrupted their updates to ask. We arrived on the 11th expecting to be talked through pulling you off life-support, but here we were getting updates on your nutrition. Your sister knew you would not want to be laying there like this. We all knew you were not supposed to be suffering any more than you already had. It was not what you or any of us wanted. I did not hear the reasons and went back to your bedside. Someone told me we were supposed to meet with a team at 10am. Everyone dispersed for a walk, a cry, tea, or coffee. I do not remember where I went.

    On the 11th, at 10am, your father, his partner, your brother, your sister, myself, my mother, and my father all sat in the room where I learned you died just the day before. Across from us, two women introduced themselves before quietly and kindly discussing next steps. They asked us to talk about who you were to us. I do not remember much of the conversation. Eventually, they explained organ donation and how it works and I realized they were preparing us for a conversation I had not anticipated. You were an organ donor, and your body had not completely died yet. Just your brain. And, amidst all of this, we could help you help other people. Several of us indicated approval of the idea. It was unquestionably what you wanted. The donor coordinator asked your dad one final time if she had permission to move forward. He made eye contact with me and I nodded (or did I say something?) and he looked to the coordinator and confidently said “it feels like a no brainer. Let’s move forward”. Here we all were in a situation where you were brain dead, having opted to be an organ donor. It was a literal no-brainer. The air in the room hung heavy as everyone quickly assessed if we should start crying over this remark or start laughing. I started laughing, tears filling my eyes. You would have thought it was funny. We looked at the time, and it was 11:11am. So, on the 11th day of the 11th month at 11:11am a group of us defined a day meant for Veterans and Hope as something else entirely. We formalized your time of death.

    Today, I woke up at 5am and could not fall back to sleep. I cried as I remembered where I was one year ago and what it felt like to not know what would happen to you. I tried to exercise but quit one-third of the way through because I could not stop crying while on the bike. I canceled the massage I scheduled because I poorly planned it to take place at 10:45am and I knew I could not stop crying or relax as 11:11am passed on the clock today. I am sitting in my dry, but sweat drenched clothes, wearing the KEXP “You are not alone” shirt your dad got you and your Eddie Bower printed fleece pullover we bought that one time at U-Village. I carved into a candle my mom gave me yesterday. The candle was made by a shaman to burn on 11/11, the angel number, the number of hope and remembrance. My mom had been saving it for herself for years, always out of town on the day or not able to get to it. She handed it to me last night after I made Grammy’s cookies for her memorial on Friday. “I realized you could use it more than me”. I carved the words “love”, “healing”, “wholeness”, “alignment”, “rest”, “peace” and “laughter” on one side. I carved your name on the other. I am going to sit here and watch it burn in between episodes of whatever I end up watching. Because today marks one year since you died and I do not know what else to do but try and remember and focus on what’s to come. David Kessler once said “Anxiety” is the Present and the Future while “Grief” is the Present and the Past. I’m firmly in Grief today. It is a relief to be here.

  • A Brick Wall

    I am overflowing and suffocating. I have felt so stuck, so unable to write. The depression is palpable, the negative bitterness spilling over from what I now see is the deep, crimson and leaded impression of pure rage. I wish I were touching the heat of a brick wall. I could dismantle the structure, feel dirt under my nails and my nails break off as I carved out the chalky and dry mortar to finally throw the bricks. I fantasize about doing this destruction often, of hearing the sound of my Rage as it reverberates off of every horrible, intrusive, and debilitating betrayal I have experienced in my life. It sounds like the heaviest xylophone falling the longest distance. An echo into forever. There is not enough cardio or weightlifting for this. Not enough words. Not enough paint. Not enough weed or alcohol. Not enough walks with Dottie or days by the pool. I am trying to climb the brick wall and the heat is singeing off my flesh, peeling away layers of my hope for the healing here. I can see parts of me stuck to the wall, remnants of my skin left to wither and die unsupported. I go places to get coffee or lunch and wonder: Can everyone here feel my seething? Rage.

    Your father wrote a poem about your mother, about his connection to her even since her passing. It was beautiful because your father is a brilliant writer and understands how to articulate longing. I read the poem and, as if reaching through time to put your hand on my shoulder, I felt you. I felt your grief. I felt the way you avoided talking about the loss of your mother. I saw you in her picture and instantly felt every piece of sadness you carried without being able to express it. And I felt your rage. For a vibrant, brief moment, my rage had someone else’s to sit next to. My rage found company. I feel rage thinking about it now. I finally understand this piece of you and you are not here to hold my hand and witness me. You died and I lost my witness. We are two shadows locked in aspects of time some fantasy novel tried to solve before. But love is still not enough in this memoir. I am exhausted having to keep learning this lesson. You died because you drank yourself to death and I cannot write you love poems. The words that come forward are so full of rage. I am scared the Rage will and is changing who I am. It’s like looking at Pandora’s Box and I know I have to open it. What will happen if someone actually sees who I become when I let the Rage come out? Will they still love me? Will I always be the parentified child who is too afraid to trust that people around me can hold all of me? Rage.

    I sobbed by the pool as I realized what you must have felt with the loss of your mother. I also sobbed as I simultaneously confronted the jealousy I have of those who can write such poems. I cannot write that poem for you. Not right now. I’m mired in fear that I might never trust anyone again. I am terrified I will be alone forever because not only do I not trust anyone, I do not trust myself. I never have and you did not help me learn how. There is history here. I picked a marriage that failed because the person did not know who they were when they married me. Before that I dated a drug addict in active heroin addiction during our relationship, a fact I did not learn until a decade later. And now you, an addict so steeped in their mental health trauma that you drank yourself to death. You said all the beautiful and correct things I needed to hear so I felt loved and trusted and adored. I wanted to believe your words, but the words of an addict leave an impression and a blank page, disappearing ink. This new version of me is exponentially more skeptical because I did not listen to myself with you. Again. Rage.  

    I was telling Randy about the Rage, about finding Rage while doing art therapy in my grief support group and about how I feel like I cannot show it to anyone. Randy then told me about the quiet his brain feels since taking an ADHD med. His description of the quiet reminded me of how it was when you started Adderall. It took forever to get the care, but you finally got prescribed last summer after being diagnosed AuDHD. The med made you so clear and you regulated your emotions with ease. You did not drink in secret. There you are, I thought. It felt like I finally had a clear picture of you, of the version of you I created my future with. As I remembered that feeling, I connected to the part of me, the Storyteller, who still feels madly in love with the man I knew was inside you. The man of my dreams. The man who was calm, intelligent, and thoughtful. The man who knew and had pain, but understood how to manage it. Who encouraged me and cheered me on. Who planned their life with me. Who wanted children with me. I feel grateful for this part, for the part of me who reminds me why I stayed. We told a beautiful story together. Until you could not get a renewed prescription because the pharmacies were out of stock. Until you died from the drinking attempting to quiet your overflowing mind. Rage.

    If my life were on film, I envision a 5 second clip that shows every warm feeling of us followed by a sprawling image of a deep, dark, cavernous Pit filled with Despair. It’s a horror movie. Aubrey Plaza is right, grief is like trying to navigate The Gorge. How can both versions of us, the good and the bad, exist in my relationship to you? I keep trying to see the depth of the gap, but there is no amount of squinting to make this clearer. I feel crazy when I try to see it all. It is with this thought I remind myself of what I tell clients all the time: “if you’re wondering if you’re crazy, the relationship is probably crazy.” Therapist Me is right.

    Rage.

  • A Maelstrom Here, a Grief Meltdown There.

    I keep looking for the words to explain the fragility of all of this, but they elude me. I write something, I read it, I edit, I delete it.

    I resided myself to participating in the things I want to, even if I have to go alone. Somewhere inside of me, I know I need to leave my house. I am so bored. I am bored of having edibles and watching tv and reading. I am bored of talking to Dottie, of sending Marco Polos to humans who care about me far away, of feeling like this. I posted recently on r/Widowers about boredom and received the most traffic on a post I ever have. Boredom was not an aspect of Grief I would think to detail, but it’s there. An unofficial stage. We should add it.

    The air is thick which feels unique to Chico. At 7:53pm it is still ninety degrees, but it feels warmer because the air is applying pressure to my skin. Humidity 41%. Not as high as in the Southern United States, but high for Chico. We are also on the overcast side of sunny which makes ninety degrees feel softer. The street is quiet. It is a Monday. The students are gone. There is very little wind. And, as I mentioned, the air is thicker than we are used to. No one likes to be outside in thick air. Except me. I am sitting on the balcony while I type this so I can feel the air awaken the cells that alert me to the feeling of density. I have missed moisture and, while different than Seattle’s, this feels comforting. It is a feeling on the outside of me aiding in the distraction from the Maelstrom happening inside of me. I have not felt this disorganized since the weeks after Jeffrey died and I am scared of it. It is consuming. I cannot focus on what I am watching and keep having to rewind things. I cannot read a sentence without rereading it. I drove around my block twice yesterday on accident.

    I am trying to live my life outside this apartment, but it is really soul shattering to carry this Grief into spaces and pretend like it is not the entirety of what I am thinking about. I have little to contribute to conversations when meeting new people because the third question after “what is your name?” and “where do you live?” is some version of “what brought you to Chico?”. I am avoiding investment in conversations with strangers because I do not have the capacity to answer this question and hold space for the responses. Do I be honest and tell them my partner died? That answer yields so much variability in responses. It stops conversations. It creates a depth of connection and intimacy with a stranger that is too overwhelming. So, do I lie? Avoid the thing I cannot avoid? This period of my life is the most socially inept I have ever felt and there are very few chapters in my life that do not include a large insecurity of social ineptitude. I run through conversations in my mind, play out the various scenarios and imagine my responses. I imagine how I will feel with each potential answer and then I am so exhausted after casting the entire skit of possibilities, I do not want to leave the house. But I leave the house anyway. I want something, anything in my life to not be about Grief. I keep looking for it. But your absence is in every fucking thing I do. The thickness of this damn air is you.

    I cried on my way to Pride. I almost did not attend because I was tired and mired in feeling the loss of you. But I went because I need to live my life and find ways to cope with this. I will keep looking for relief until I exhaust all possible solutions. As I drove to Pride, I Marco Polo’d with my sister and admitted that I was struggling with going because you are not here. I needed someone to know. I am attending this event because you died, and I have to figure out how to live my life now without you. I really cannot adequately explain how absolutely fucked that is.

    Chico is small as towns go, so you have to look harder for queer joy than you do in Seattle. Chico Pride was everything I could want it to be. I was so happy to be amongst drag queens, leather daddies, trans joy, and queer love. I wanted to attend because I miss this community. While I identify as cisgender and heterosexual, the LGBT community has always felt like family. Plus, I was married to a woman even if I did not know she was a woman the whole time. There still is not a letter for those of us with that relationship experience. A gap in our language.

    I also attended Pride with two objectives: 1) to see if I could find volunteer information with a queer organization and 2) to see if there was a queer therapist collective and introduce myself. I give myself homework when I attend things alone. I have to talk to at least one person I do not know and introduce myself to at least one other person. Two points of contact. These tasks help me mark time and give me something outside of Grief to focus on. I found the therapists first, but I feel like I botched my introduction. I had not practiced what I would say to them and the dysregulation from crying in the car translated into an awkward answer to Question Three. Hopefully they forget I exist by January 2027. That is when I can finally licensed to practice with people in California. I’ll reintroduce myself as a cool potential colleague they should definitely know/work with… I digress. I also got contact information for volunteering, whenever I decide I can do that. I left Pride after an hour, after feeling the fourth drip of sweat fall from my thighs and onto the concrete. I am not acclimated to ninety-six degrees and direct sunlight. I completed my objectives. I was done. I needed to rest before Shakespeare in the Park. I needed to ground.

    On Sunday, I attended Bonfire Storytelling, and it destroyed me. On the heels of the day before, I woke up Sunday more mired in my aloneness. I wanted to tell you about Shakespeare in the Park and ask how old you thought the sycamore tree was behind the stage. I wanted to know if you noticed we were sitting under the Big Dipper. I wanted to know if you knew Shakespeare was clearly a feminist based on Beatrice’s Monologue in Act 4, Scene 1. I wanted to know if you felt like Chico was Stars Hallow. We never got to talk about that. But, you were not there on Sunday morning because exactly 7 months before Sunday, I found you on our dining room floor not breathing. You drank yourself to death. At Pride, a woman with resources for suicide awareness told me her husband completed suicide eleven years ago. I answered her “my partner died because of drinking seven months ago and while not the same…” she cut me off and informed me “it’s the same.” I did not and do not disagree although I did not love her telling me what happened to you when I am struggling with it.

    I can feel the Maelstrom in what I am writing. This story feels all over the place. There is not a flow to it. And I keep trying to fix that, but I cannot. This story is much like what is happening to me. A choppy series of events with the only common entity being my disoriented and traumatized brain trying to see it all and remember.

    While I sat amidst my Sunday Morning Maelstrom attempting to take inventory of which thing to pay attention to, I remembered I spent money on a ticket, that I promised myself to experience my life, that I would regret not going Bonfire. So I went. I cried in the car on the way there. I stood at the edge of the room for a while before deciding to get a glass of wine and find a place to sit. I paid for the wine with cash, not realizing one of the one dollar bills had a “In Trump We Trust” stamp before handing it to the bar tender and feeling like an idiot for having such a ridiculous bill at an event that could not be less interested or less protected by our president. I found an empty seat next to two chairs with fuscia Post-Its that said Marie and Anne. “I bet they are safe”, I said to myself, “those are safe-people names”. Two women with more experience than me took Anne and Marie’s seats. We introduced ourselves. Neither Anne or Marie got to Question Three. I was right. They were safe.

    Bonfire Storytelling is structured such that one storyteller represents each decade and tells a story on theme. For this month, a person in their 20s, 30s, 40s, and so on stood on stage to tell a Pride related story to Kiss and Tell. I cried listening to young, new love blossom, to the hopefulness of those who just got married after finding themselves and their person. To the joy of finding gender, sex, and sexuality when so many systems continue to tell them not to do so. I connected to what it felt like to feel hopefulness with you and I cried for everything we will never ever be. For the kids we will never ever have. For the questions I will never ever get to ask you. For all the stories you will never ever tell me. I masked the crying well, wiping tears from my eyes before they fell down my face. I splashed cold water on my face at intermission. I took breaths of fresh, ninety-five degree air.

    The final storyteller, Decade 60s, took us through the journey of his life. He described the men he met and was not ready for, the love he looked at, grabbed, and lost. Decade 60s lost his soul mate to AIDS. As he explained grief as being like wearing gloves for protection but missing the feeling of a cold door handle, I audibly lost my breath. Anne (or Marie?) gave me a tissue. It soaked up every tear as I listened to Decade 60s explain what it is like to feel what I am feeling. To feel emptiness and weight as you move about the world. To miss Before and resent After. Then, he explained the part I do not have experience with yet, the one I keep wondering about, and am scared of. He explained what it is like to find love again but still have a hole limiting the ability to truly experience lightness as you did Before. This was the part that broke me the most. This man was so much further along in his grief journey, but still so present with its atrocity. This [motions to the space around her] is really never going away. This is forever. You died. And I am never going to be in a life without you. In fact, if I do this right, I will live more of my life without you, than I did with you. I am not getting happily ever after. I am getting [motions all around her more frantically] this. His story ended and I took inventory of how many others were crying. Quite a few, but not in the way I was. They were crying in a fear of that loss, in an extrapolation, not in the reality of it’s tessellation. There is a very big difference.

    The musical guests, vocalist Andrew Kinley and pianist Vianna Boring, performed two songs for us to complete the show. The first song was Rise Up by Andra Day. And no, I cannot make this shit up. For those who do not know the lyrics to this song, I included them below. Listening to the liquid nature of Andrew’s voice as these words wrapped around me was once in a lifetime. I feel like all I need is hope, but I am struggling to find it. I am supposed to be rising up, and I am, but I do not feel lighter or better for it. I feel emptiness all the time, even while sitting in a  room full of people who probably know this feeling better than anyone. For as much as there is Queer Joy, there is Queer Grief. In some ways, the grief is what makes the joy so much more palpable.

    The final song was Somewhere Over the Rainbow. Again, I really cannot make this up. Where is the proverbial knife twisting inside my body? Why, or why, can’t I?

    I cried the entire drive home. I cried as I parked and sent Heather a Marco Polo of me crying, of how horrible I was feeling. I cried as I thought about how many people I will inevitably to have to help and guide to understand this feeling because I am learning a lesson at 36 most people my age will not learn until they are much older than we are now. I cried because this is so unfair.

    I got it together enough to walk Dottie around the block for her final outing. We took our time. She has become very leash reactive and does not seem to trust me while on a walk. I am really working on retraining with her because I know I can do better. And while I feel like an utter failure of a pet parent, I think I can be a good dog mom. As we rounded a corner toward the backside of the block, a rainbow hovered above Bidwell Park. Because the air was thick and the sun was setting, light beams refracted color. I laughed before I started crying again. I wondered if I was bleeding out from that proverbial knife. There was nothing about yesterday that would let me escape your loss. It was everywhere I went. As if I could forget about it. As if I have a choice in the matter.

    I am starting to understand more deeply why people become addicts. Anything but this constant barrage is starting to seem appealing. And when I imagine a lifetime of you not being here, I start to wonder what I am doing this for. Then I have the first edible I have had in a couple weeks, watch an episode of Love Island, and go to bed at 9pm to start over again the next day. Maybe tomorrow will be different.

    Rise Up by Andra Day

    You’re broken down and tired
    Of living life on a merry go round
    And you can’t find the fighter
    But I see it in you so we gonna walk it out
    And move mountains
    We gonna walk it out
    And move mountains

    And I’ll rise up
    I’ll rise like the day
    I’ll rise up
    I’ll rise unafraid
    I’ll rise up
    And I’ll do it a thousand times again
    And I’ll rise up
    High like the waves
    I’ll rise up
    In spite of the ache
    I’ll rise up
    And I’ll do it a thousand times again

    For you
    For you
    For you
    For you

    When the silence isn’t quiet
    And it feels like it’s getting hard to breathe
    And I know you feel like dying
    But I promise we’ll take the world to its feet
    And move mountains
    Bring it to its feet
    And move mountains

    And I’ll rise up
    I’ll rise like the day
    I’ll rise up
    I’ll rise unafraid
    I’ll rise up
    And I’ll do it a thousand times again

    For you
    For you
    For you
    For you

    All we need, all we need is hope
    And for that we have each other
    And for that we have each other
    And we will rise
    We will rise
    We’ll rise, oh, oh
    We’ll rise

    I’ll rise up
    Rise like the day
    I’ll rise up
    In spite of the ache
    I will rise a thousand times again
    And we’ll rise up
    High like the waves
    We’ll rise up
    In spite of the ache
    We’ll rise up
    And we’ll do it a thousand times again

    For you
    For you
    For you
    For you

    Ah, ah, ah, ah

  • Grief Makes New Sounds

    Yesterday during therapy I sobbed so intensely I heard a sound I never heard come out of my body. It was somewhere between the pitch a hiccup and hyperventilating. I do not know how to describe it. 

    Mom said I need to talk in therapy about what is going to happen next week, about walking into the home we shared, the home where I found you not breathing on our dining room floor. “It’s too soon in the grief process for you to have to be doing this”. As if I did not know. I knew my mom was right because the thought I had the two times she brought it up was, “why are you focusing on this? I don’t have a choice but to go there and pack up our things and pointing out what’s hard about it isn’t going to get all this stuff done.” Defensiveness is always holding up a mirror. 

    I am overwhelmed. There really is so much to do. I need to sort through your shirts and select the ones I want to keep so someone can help me make a quilt. I need to donate your wheel chair and other medical supplies to the organization who helped you get a wheel chair at no cost after your injury. I need to donate your Trike to the organization that helps folks with disabilities get outside, that helped you test ride different bikes to figure out which one was best for your accessibility needs. I could sell the Trike, it’s worth a lot of money, but that feels wrong when a grant helped you buy it. I need to give your dad space and time to identify what he wants from your things. I need to figure out what I can sell or give away as quickly as possible so I do not have to pack more than necessary. I need to coordinate for a junk person to take the things we cannot haul or donate ourselves. I need to clean and remove my existence from the home I lived in for 8 years, 1 spouse’s gender transition, 1 divorce, 1 pandemic, 1 graduate school degree, 1 engagement, 1 career ending and another starting, and 1 fiancé death. I need to decide what of your things I am not sure I will regret giving away. I plan to box them and write your name on the boxes with a Sharpie. Do I store those boxes in the new apartment or a storage unit? Do I want reminders of this confronting me daily or do I need to put them somewhere? 

    These questions feel impossible to answer. My mom is right, it is too soon. But I am not getting a choice in making decisions about my timeline for grief. I have to do all of this next week. I did not ask to or sign up for it, but this is happening. When I let in what I feel about being in our home, new noises reverberate through and out of my body. You died when I was not ready and now I have to participate in the next chapter of the trauma triggered by the worst day of my life, the day you died. I am not ready. It is too soon.

    I cannot decide if I want to sleep in the apartment or even be in there alone. My parents got a hotel room because eventually there will not be a bed in the place I am trying to remove my existence from. I cannot decide if I will regret not giving myself the time to be in our home, my home, the home the holds so much of my life, of who I am. The apartment holds every painful moment of my life and there are so many of them. It holds my survival and my accomplishments. How do I decide if I can handle being in there? How do I look at your jackets, fold them, and give them away? Will I miss the dumb dice you bought too many of? The coffee mug with yours and your uncle’s name on it? The duvets and bedding we picked out together. You used to sit in the green chair in the office and read a book while I worked. But I do not need the chair. The blankets hold your smell. They hold us. All of these things hold us. Hold a lifetime no longer happening. A dream that is a nightmare I cannot and will not ever wake up from.

    I told Heather I keep waiting for my life to get bigger than this grief, but that is not happening. The grief is everywhere I go. It is reflected on the face of everyone who sees me. Everything I do, I’m doing while Grief is sitting on my chest, punching me in the throat, mocking me.

    We leave on Friday morning. An 11 hour drive to the guillotine. I feel like I am preparing to stare down the sun. I know I will lose eyesight, but there is nothing I can do to stop it. I need to get used to looking at this duller version of the world, but its sepia tones are so muted and dystopian.

    What the fuck?

  • A Real Pain

    Last night I had my first night alone since you died. I walked all three dogs and did not trip on or lose any of them. I readied their dinner. I reheated leftovers for myself and watched the latest episode Traitors. I ate a small white chocolate cheesecake from Savor Ice Cream. I can confirm it is dangerous those tiny cakes are walking distance from my new apartment. I will be back. 

    I watched A Real Pain and felt like I was watching a movie about you. To be clear, it was not a movie about you at all. You are not Jewish, nor have Jewish family history in Poland. You also do not have a male cousin you would travel with in order to participate in a Polish Holocaust Tour because a grandmother left you money to visit her family home. But Kieran Culkin’s character felt like you, loving and suffering and entertaining and loathing. Caring for everyone and no one. Looking for meaning and finding a loss for words. Feeling everything and feeling numb to feeling at all. Having feelings so big, people turned away in discomfort. The film was brilliant in its complexity and artistry, in the acting and the writing. I wish you could see it to dissect it with me although I know it would be hard for you to watch. It was, true to its title, a real pain.

    Once again, I am struck by how close you feel and how far away you are. You are nowhere and everywhere. I did a Sound Bath on Friday and the image of you laying on the floor next to me resonated through my body. I imagined your breath on my neck, you were so close. Tears poured onto the weighted eye mask I borrowed from the studio. To prevent panic, my brain switched gears into wondering what instruments and tools created the sounds. How does thunder emanate from a bowl and rain fall from a stick? One moment we were surrounded by the lapping of waves on the shore which transitioned into the twinkling whimsy of chimes. What makes all of that happen? I miss our endless conversation about whatever we were curious about.

    I wish you could taste the cheesecake. It was airy and not too sweet. You always talked about a cheesecake you used to make and promised to make it for me one day. I wonder how this one compared. I guess that is another thing I can file into my mysteries folder. That and the circumstances that allowed someone to discover how to trap the sound of thunder in a bowl.