how did i get here?

my husband, my beautiful Dragon, died suddenly at 12:03 AM on 9 February 2009. there was a cold, lovely full moon and 3 feet of snow on the ground. i "slept" for the following 10 months and "woke" to the physical and emotional pain and torments of deep grief. i "woke" to find i had moved the day of his funeral and that i am lost. i am looking for me while i figure out the abstract, unanswerable questions that follow behind any death. my art has evolved. his death changed that as well because i am forever changed and will forever bear the mark of losing the only man i can ever love.
there is alive and there is dead and there is a place in between. i am here wholly in my heart for my children, but i feel empty inside at this time. i miss him. i have not gotten very far in my grief journey. i make no apologies for this.
this is my place, my blog, where i write to tell the universe that i am still here.

Sunday, October 14, 2012

dead like me

i've heard and always known, "what you do matters.  what you don't do matters."  i try to make every moment count.  i work hard.  i keep a million things in my head.  multi-task.  i come back here to the apartment and i work.   and then i fall into the mattress on the floor. 

i think:  someday i'll save up and get a new mattress. 

i think:  someday i'll take a day or two and go over to the ocean.

i think:  someday i'll find a friend.

and then the pragmatic part of me reminds me that i need to make a car payment, car insurance payment, my lease will be up and my rent will be raised, and i need that surgery.  this isn't Canada and my insurance is only for 80%.  i hurt physically a lot. 

but i also hurt emotionally.  really wish i could find a friend, but when will i have the time?  or the balls to take the risk?  i'm a nothing little nobody and i am tired.

~~

my boss came into the store and was on a rampage.  "why did you put that double-sided tape under the velcro rolls?  we don't fucking use the velcro rolls as often as we use the fucking double-sided tape?" 
me:  sorry.  me in my head:  "are you fucking serious about being upset that you have to reach under something that weighs once ounce?"

she was pissed that i had put some bears on the counter while i cleaned the bin.  "why are all these fucking bears on the counter?  didn't i tell you to keep the counter clean?"
me:  sorry.  me in my head:  "are you fucking serious giving me shit about putting bears on the counter for less that 5 minutes while i clean a bin you told me to clean?  how the fuck do i clean the bin with the bears in there?  my levitation skills suck."

and more of the same.  i went to the bathroom and sobbed.  i put my head down on my hands on the sink and sobbed.

what we do matters.  what we don't do matters. 

i try so very hard.  i know i do good work.  i never am told though.  i do get shit for stuff like that up there.  and it's lame stuff.  just another way of doing the same thing.  it all comes out the same in the end.  i kept telling myself she was mad at someone else/something else that she couldn't yell out; so she gave me hell.

and the worst part is i expected it.  i expect to be treated like that because ........... it's all i know.  and i allow it.

yeah, Eleanor Roosevelt,  the whole people walk on your if you lie down, but i have to lie down.  i am only an assistant manager.  and shit rolls uphill.  if one of my part time managers makes a mistake, i get hell for it because they are my responsibility.  i can't just pass the blame.  "on, {insert name} did or didn't to that."  that's stupid to do and i refuse to be stupid.  i am, however, quite quick to lay down and get walked on, stomped on, if only to get it fucking over with.

i feel dead inside still and i don't know if that's a bad thing or normal, or just a me thing that will be from now on.  have i accepted that his death, the fact that i will never be loved again, never be seen as a real person with depth and feelings, accepted grief to the point that i am used to it and this is what acceptance feels like, or am i so fucked up from all the abuse over the course of my life that i have had my behavior and thought processes modified to the extent that i cringe when someone calls my name, or forgets i exist?  that i accept more abuse? 

i feel dead inside.  i was so excited to see my son in Florida.  and then i came back here.  reality sucks.  i was excited to start hitting golf balls at the driving range but i haven't had another day off since that one day and i won't have another day off until next Tuesday.  and that day i have to go to the doctor fasting for some more tests.  and to see about that damn surgery which i fucking refuse to have.

i do sometimes wonder if anyone else feels dead like me or if this is, like grief, my own personal, lonely journey.

what's crazy is that my daughter says i am a delightful person who has wonderful stories and a great sense of humor, if only someone would take the time to really get to know me.  i can be a fun girl.

i really can.

i can be interesting.  maybe it's revulsion at my physical appearance.  i've lost so much weight. i'm not slim but i'm better looking that i was a year and a half ago.  maybe contacts.  lose the specs.  makeup?  streak my hair? 

that would all be fake.  it wouldn't be me.  and it would take away from my new mattress fund.

my mother got mad at me once; she was always mad at me for something.  she pinched my throat and yelled at me that i was ugly and not a girly girl like guys like and that i would die alone.

as a child i was so afraid of her and i used to think she was a little crazy,

but i guess she was also a prophet.

what you do matters.  what you don't do matters.

i try to do the best i can.  i don't have a lot to offer anyone so i don't expect to have a friend during the rest of my life.

i miss you, Dragon.  more than you'll ever know.  i like to believe/remember that you liked me and that, to you, i wasn't ugly.  you're dead.  i'm dead inside.  i guess we still have a lot in common.  {pssst. Dragon.  am i depressed or is it normal to be this down?  are you there?  }

1 comments:

Anonymous said...

I feel dead inside too. Either it's normal or we are wired similarly and react the same way to the loss of our loves. I also get excited from time to time about little weekend trips or special visits from family, but as soon as the visit ends and I'm "home" alone, the deadness resurfaces. And I realize the fleeting excitement or hope I feel is only a glaze over the deadness, which is real and deep and always remains.

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