I have been here before. Surrounded by people I love but lost in the vastness of my own despair. People are talking to me but their voices carry over my head like the sounds you hear while submerged in a hot bath tub trying to soak away the worries of the world. Muted tones, blurred words. My pain raises in my throat like a lump of hot coal. My throat burns as I try to swallow. I suppress the urge to cry out. I choke on my own grief. Tears spill out, roll down my cheeks and expose me. This is my reaction to someone else’s loss. Why? The question I ask myself every time someone I love loses someone they love.
Grief is a strange thing. Emotions crash over me like waves on a sun soaked beach. People in the business of Psychology will tell you grief has stages. I always thought that was horseshit and feathers until I joined the club. This club has many members and no one is here willingly. If given a choice most people want more time with their loved one; to live another day, to love with every ounce of their being, to laugh until they can’t, to hold onto the magic of them, to make one last memory, to acknowledge their stronghold on your heart.
Seldom does anyone get those chances. Love the people in your life while they are with you. Get angry, fight, be involved, just don’t forget to STOP and LOVE and LAUGH and EMBRACE. Make a memory. Have you ever seen the movie Artificial Intelligence ? I can not watch this movie without crying. It portrays happiness in it’s purest form and grief so raw it burns. This movie pulls at all the important emotions that make life worth living.
I’ve spent many years unable to accept kind words or deeds done in memory of my loved ones because my soul was too broken and numb. I was unable to hear anything above my own anguish. Perhaps that is why I cry when I am faced with a loss that is not mine. I still struggle to maintain a peace within myself over the loss of my family. I often wonder if I will ever feel whole again. Never under estimate what you mean to someone else.
Means “archway” in Latin. Janus was the Roman god of gateways and beginnings, often depicted as having two faces looking in opposite directions. The month of January is named for him. January is the month of reflection. We all look back on the year that is leaving and we worry about what is rounding the corner of what will become the new year. I stopped making New Year resolutions before I was out of my teen age years or did I? That is a question I have been chewing on since mid- December. I think my life long resolution remains; be the best version of yourself everyday!
I refuse to waste anymore time on the year that has just ended. My life is not a script. There are no re-writes to be handed in, no rehearsals for opening night. This is it kid, your life in glorious Technicolor. I don’t always like the path I am traveling on. I whine. I complain. I cry. I carry around resentment like a toy poodle in a hand bag. I get so sick of myself I want to be anyone but ME. No matter where I try to run I am right there with ME baffled by own stupidity. I have had enough. I will not continue to punish myself for my shortcomings anymore.
Okay for a while but pity parties are real downers so tonight after one last huzzah I jumped back into the boxcar for the slow ride to The Land of Normal Sizes. There is more work to be done. I have started to think of myself in a new light. I am not fat. I am thinner. Well? I am thinner, than I used to be.
notsolargemarge 