15 Months

Yesterday marked 15 months without Jason. The same amount of time he battled glioblastoma before he died. So 30 months…2 and a half years…that life has been…I don’t even have the word. A struggle? A fight? Stressful? Fucked up? Unreal? Too real? Yes to all of that.

I woke up yesterday and just didn’t want to. Mornings are always difficult…the remembering again. Reaching a hand across the bed and finding dog fur instead of my husband. Yesterday, I just laid there and cried. I just didn’t want to…any of it…anymore. And then I reminded myself of a conversation I had with Seth a few weeks ago. Seth…who struggles so hard with his Dad being gone…and I think so often feels alone in his grief. I flat out told him that it is him and his brother and sister that keep me going…because I don’t feel like doing anything most of the time. And that it is loving them and wanting them to be happy so badly…that makes me get up everyday and keep my shit together. I think they were words he needed to hear…and that I needed to tell myself yesterday

So I got up and did the day…again…managed to hide my sadness…mostly.

Today is a rainy, gloomy Saturday. I told myself I was going to be motivated to do a bunch of house cleaning today. I did clean our room…including uncovering my desk from the pile of papers on top of it so my writing area is open again. That makes me happy. Other than that…yeah…it’s 4pm and I haven’t gotten dressed…and don’t remember the last time I showered. My hair tells me maybe Thursday…but could’ve been Wednesday. I just don’t really care. I did write a poem while I was dusting…

Dust

And as I wipe the dust from your urn
I yearn for the dust inside to reform
And you to return

Like a genie from a lamp in a tale
The caress of my hand a wish
You whole and hale

But magic left my life with your end
Wishes go unanswered
Into the wind

Our hopes, dreams, love, happiness
Reduced to memory
Ash and sadness

I don’t know how to live my life for the pleasure of living anymore…for myself…not our kids. I’m lonely, but most of the time don’t want to make plans. And if I do have plans there’s always a big part of me that is hoping they will fall through and I can just stay home. Those times when I am enjoying myself….like last Saturday in Eau Claire…I know that the instant I get home my mood will crash because Jason won’t be waiting there for me…ready to listen to me talk about my day. There’s a hollowness inside and a pressure building…all at the same time. Like I just want to scream at the top of my lungs…but would anyone hear me? Would anyone care? Pretty sure it would just get the dogs all wound up.

It’s impossibly difficult to go from sharing life so completely with someone…having your happiness…sadness…hopes…dreams…future…past…so entwined with each other–to this. I don’t know what to “do”. Instead of looking forward to retirement with Jason by my side…spending our glory years together…traveling…watching our kids and our grandkids–when I look to the future now I see…nothing. Every single dream had him in it. Honestly, I think once I retire I’ll buy a small cabin by some lake somewhere and spend my days watching the water lap the shore and my nights staring into a fire and listening to it crackle.

Hemingway once said, “There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed”. I guess I had a lot of “bleeding” to do today.